


A Star Fell From Heaven

by GammaSpectrum



Series: Bolide Impact [1]
Category: Stardust (2007), Supernatural
Genre: Action/Adventure, Canon-Typical Violence, Castiel as the Fallen Star, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Dean's demon deal, Deviates From Canon, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fairy Tale Elements, M/M, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Romance, Shockingly More Canon Compliant Than You Are Probably Expecting, Slow Burn, Stardust Fusion, Supernatural season 3, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-08
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-08-13 05:03:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 77,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20168608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GammaSpectrum/pseuds/GammaSpectrum
Summary: Dean's demon deal is rapidly coming due, and with the pain of Mystery Spot not too far removed, Sam is desperately looking for any way to save his brother. A run-of-the-mill witch hunt turns up a potential way out, but only if the Winchester brothers can retrieve a fallen star from across a strange wall in the middle of a cursed forest.However, it quickly becomes apparent that fallen stars in Faerie aren't space rocks, and the stakes are a lot higher than Sam and Dean realized.





	1. There Once Was A Story About A Witch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story would not have ever been published if it weren't for [WarlockWriter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WarlockWriter/pseuds/WarlockWriter) kindly being my first reader and encouraging me to finish the story.

Sam Winchester was searching the internet for news of the weird and unexplained, although his heart wasn’t really in it. Time was running out for his brother, and despite all of Ruby’s promises, the demon had not provided a single piece of information that hinted at a way out of Dean’s deal. The only thing that Sam could think to do, in the meantime, was to look for hunts and to try to research demon contracts himself.

Of course, that was easier said than done for a man who had been legally declared dead and had only what resources credit card fraud and pool hustling could buy. It wasn’t as if there was much of any lore on the actual nature of demon contracts, let alone what might be written in them, what loopholes they might have, or if there was anything that could break them. Anyone with the least amount of common sense would realize that Sam’s task was an impossible one. The information he was looking for simply wasn’t there. Sam still persevered, hoping against hope that common sense was wrong.

A tab on his computer chimed, as a news story broke. Sam had set up a Google Alert or two, for certain keywords, and this news article contained several of them. He clicked the link and began to read:

> The Mining Journal
> 
> **Spontaneous Combustion** Halts Advancement of the Hawk Silver Mining Co.
> 
> BIG BAY - The Hawk Silver Mining Company released a statement today following the **unexplained spontaneous immolation** of two of its employees. The statement did not address the deaths directly, but instead blamed the decision to withdraw its business plans from the area on an irretrievable breakdown in negotiations between the mining company and local landowner Elaine Morgan.
> 
> Ms. Morgan was unavailable for comment but has previously expressed her unwillingness to allow any mining to take place on her property, despite the Hawk Silver Mining Co.’s insistence that she has a rich vein running under several square miles of her property. She has repetitively discussed that she believes that any mining in the area would disturb pristine wilderness and watersheds that have great personal and environmental importance.
> 
> Several individuals, who spoke anonymously, report that Morgan was seen arguing loudly with the deceased mine scouts before they suddenly caught flame outside of the Lumberjack Tavern. Local authorities have not yet released an official cause of death, but have stated that while unusual, they believe that both men may have been struck by lightning. No storms were reported in the area at that time, however.

Sam bit his lower lip and considered whether such lean pickings were really suggestive of a witch, and if it was worth the trouble of bringing it up to Dean.

They were already in Ohio, so it wouldn’t be a truly long road trip, but it was March and that far north there would still be snow and ice on the roads. Also, Michigan’s upper peninsula was shockingly desolate, with most towns consisting of little more than a post office, a church, a bar, a collection of a half dozen houses and maybe a motel if they were very lucky.

Sam glanced out the window. The motel was a couple blocks from the bar that Dean had walked to, and he wasn’t back yet. Sam was pretty sure that he wouldn’t be back until the bar closed, if he bothered to come back here at all. That depended on whether or not Dean was still acting like… well… like he didn’t have much time left and therefore he ought to live it to the fullest.

His research into demons and contracts had been going nowhere fast, so Sam opened another new tab and searched the name “Elaine Morgan” into it. With a few modifications to the search, he managed to find the woman the article had likely been speaking about.

The dispute with the mining company was perhaps less shocking than it could have been. The land, all 26,880 acres of it, had been owned by the Morgan family since the mid-1800s. They were reclusive and extremely wealthy, to the point that other than the matriarch of the time, no one had ever seen another member of the family.

Of course rumors flew. It was a tiny community that was just outside of this vast swathe of primordial forest, safe-guarded by an eccentric and wealthy woman. There was even a small guard-shack on the only road that approached the property, always manned, to keep out trespassers, curious tourists and local hunters. The townspeople had called her a witch and claimed that she was immortal, fudging records and changing her name over the years. The area was even called the Witch’s Wood by locals, or the Huron Mountain Witch Forest by local tourist pamphlets.

Sam clicked through more stories and more rumors. Most were fairly standard fare. Times when cows had gone dry when she’d given them an odd look. Stones pelting a man who had snuck past the guard shack and tried to poach a large buck off her property. A petty local woman going bald after speaking unkindly to one of the Morgan women, and so on and so forth. There were a few cases of people going missing and never being heard from again, as well. Including the apparently notable case of a young woman named Virginia Trombley who had disappeared at the age of twenty-five back in the early 1900s, but nothing that stood out to Sam as definitely witchy. Yet, there were no reports, no rumors, of any Morgan woman (or maybe just Elaine herself, if she was a witch enjoying some variant of eternal youth) actually killing anyone. Not until two weeks ago.

Bored, Sam continued reading.

It was two-thirds down a forum post about local legends, and it was a long post, but there it was, the mention of demon and deal, and a contract canceled:

> _I was told this story when I was eleven and camping with a couple of my friends out by Gobbler’s Knob. I think they’ve changed the name since then, but we knew the family that owned the hill back then and they’d agreed to let me and my friends stay overnight on the hill, with a parent to supervise. My mom had come along and helped us get a campfire going on top of the hill, and we had a good time roasting hot dogs and marshmallows and generally doing the sort of things pre-teens do when sleeping in a tent about four miles from home on a family friend’s property and with a Mom to make sure we didn’t get ate by a bear or break our legs or burn down half the peninsula._
> 
> _When it got late, though, of course we started telling ghost stories. Being eleven we tried to scare one another with the usual urban legends. Bloody Mary, the Hook Man, you know. And then my mom said, as best as I can recall how she told it, “All right, all right, enough of that. If you really want to hear a scary story, I’ll tell you one. My mother told it to me, and it was her sister that was one of the children that it happened to, so she swore that it was all true.”_
> 
> _“It was just past the turn of the century, round about 1908, when my aunt and her three friends went out to play. They’d intended to go splash in the shallows of Lake Independence, but one of the boys teased the other three about not being brave enough to venture up to Witch’s Wood. Seeing as being called a chicken was the very worst thing to be called by a little boy when you’re round about twelve, my aunt and her friends agreed to hike up to Squaw Beach and then follow the beach until they came to Witch’s Wood (and therefore avoid the guards that stop tourists on the road).”_
> 
> _“So after a long hike and a few scraped knees and lots of getting wet and muddy, my aunt and her friends crossed into the Witch’s Wood. They knew it was Witch’s Wood because the trees were old and wide, and the undergrowth wasn’t so thick and choking. They kept to the beach until they came to a stream that they could follow inland, and then they dared one another to see how deep they could go. Because of course they were frightened that the witch would catch them and turn them all to toads.”_
> 
> _“But even when they rounded the bend of the stream and could no longer see Superior, the witch did not come, so they ventured deeper and deeper, until, quite suddenly, a voice called out to them: ‘Hello little kidlings!’”_
> 
> _“They turned and saw something that looked like a man, dressed in Sunday best, sitting atop a pile of gray stones.”_
> 
> _“They jumped and screamed, because they were quite startled seeing a man in Sunday best atop a pile of grey stone in Witch’s Wood.”_
> 
> _“The man screamed back in imitation of them, and then laughed, slapping his knee in mirth.”_
> 
> _“You’re not the witch!” said the boy that had goaded them into this misadventure._
> 
> _“The witch? The witch? Who’s the witch? No, I’m not a witch, childling. You may call me… Mr. Qalba, if you wish.”_
> 
> _My aunt remembers him tilting his head oddly and then asking, “Now tell me, what are you doing in a place where you expect a witch?”_
> 
> _The other little girl said, “We wanted to show that we weren’t afraid of the witch of Witch’s Wood, so we came here to play.”_
> 
> _“Oh. Oh! Playing in the woods. That’s fun. I don’t play much anymore, and certainly not among trees that belong to witches. I came to speak with the Morgan, and see if I can grant her wishes for a favor. And that’s why I’m sitting on these rocks and leaning on her trees, when it seems I startled four little child-lings.”_
> 
> _One of the children asked if Mr. Qalba was a genie, like in the Arabian Tales, and he replied, cheerfully, “I once met a djinn, and I wouldn’t like to meet another, no sir. Mean things more often than not. But where wishes are concerned, I peddle them easy enough. If you’ll trade a thing for them, I’ll grant you a wish.”_
> 
> _Being children and maybe not very wise, what Mr. Qalba asked of them they agreed to give for a wish each. And this is what my aunt said they asked for: the girl wished for the good health of her family (for her little brother was very sickly), the older boy wished for a white charger horse and a sword to go with it, and the younger boy wished to see all the world. My aunt was a little wiser, for she asked that she would get her Heart’s Desire, because that was what fairy tales said you should ask for. In return, Mr. Qalba asked for: half the breath in the girl’s lung, the hearing of the older boy’s right ear, the memories of the younger boy’s life before he was four, and all the color in my aunt’s eyes. And being children, they agreed._
> 
> _And when the deal was struck, the other girl could no longer breathe easily, and the older boy could hear nothing at all in his right ear and became dizzy and ill, and the younger boy began to cry inconsolably, and all the color drained out of the world for my aunt._
> 
> _And that was when the witch came. She came in the crack of a lightning bolt and she came with the wind from the lake at her back. And she stood before the demon, who sat upon his rocks, and waggled a long finger at him._
> 
> _“How dare you come among my trees and rest on my rocks and peddle wishes to children!” said the witch as she gathered the children toward her. “You undo what you have done at once! Or I shall send you back to your Master with lightning licking at your heels.”_
> 
> _And the demon whispered something unpleasant to the ear, and what had been taken from the children was returned, and what had been given was taken back from them. (For in town, the little brother had suddenly breathed easier for a few minutes and now fell into a swoon, and a horse had appeared in the backyard of another house and now disappeared into the woods, and the other things perhaps would have come in time.)_
> 
> _And in a wisp of black smoke the demon disappeared. The children were still crying and begging that the witch not turn them into toads for playing in her woods, and this is what my aunt said to my mother that the witch said to them as she sat on the moss near the muddy banks of the little stream._
> 
> _“You shouldn’t come playing here. It’s not safe, and not because of me. But will you tell me what you wished from him, since you’ve ventured so far, and been brave enough to sit with me?”_
> 
> _So my aunt told her._
> 
> _And the witch looked thoughtful. “Go find me the two prettiest river stones you can find, little ones. Two from each of you.”_
> 
> _And since the witch didn’t seem so frightful, they did what she asked. And they found six agates between them, and two Petoskey stones, and they gave them to the witch._
> 
> _The lovelier of the two stones, the witch took and tucked into the pockets of her skirts. The remaining stone she picked up, eyed it in the lingering afternoon sunlight, and then blew upon it. And when she was done, she announced, “There. Now this is a wish stone, white as the horse you will someday ride.” And she gave it to the boy that had wished for a white horse. And my aunt said that when the Great War broke out, the boy rode a white horse in the cavalry, and both horse and boy came back from the war, unharmed. She repeated this with another stone, but this time said, “And this is a healing stone, put it into the pocket of one unwell and they will be better by twilight.” Indeed, the family of the little girl never suffered from any cold longer than a day. Or so my mother recounted to me. She now seemed to polish the Petoskey stone with nothing but the palms of her hands, and then pulled from the air a black cord to hang it upon like a pendant, and she gave it to the younger boy, saying, “This stone will see all corners of the world, and bring luck while it does so.” The younger boy went away to university and travelled the world as an archaeologist, later in life, and saw every continent except Antarctica. And my aunt swore he was never without his Petoskey stone._
> 
> _At last she turned to my aunt. Neither agate she’d found was particularly pretty, but the witch turned the uglier of the two over and over in her palm anyway. “A Heart’s Desire is not an easy thing to grant,” the witch said, “because it is not always obvious, and rarely what we think we want. However, it is always worth the trouble to seek and the price to keep.” A flame curled around the little agate in the witch’s palm and seemed to settle in the heart of the small stone. And the witch pressed it into my aunt’s hand. And then she whispered into my aunt’s ear the instructions for the stone.”_
> 
> _We complained that this wasn’t a very good ghost story, even if we didn’t think my mother had made it up on the spot. But she smiled at us girls, and she pulled out a small little stone, like smoked glass with an ember at its heart, and she let us each turn it over in our hands. And, that day, we all believed the story we’d been told._
> 
> _I’m older now, and I don’t know if I believe in witches and demons, and I don’t know what my great-aunt’s Heart’s Desire was, or if she got it, because she disappeared when she was twenty-five. But before my great-aunt left, she gave my grandmother a little clear agate that seemed almost to glow, as if an ember was in its very center. And my mother said that my grandmother said that her sister had whispered instructions in her ear for the stone._
> 
> _I guess that my mother got her Heart’s Desire, too, when the stone was given to her, and she was told its secret because she was married to my father, happily, all her life. Still is. And when I was twenty-five she gave me that little stone and whispered the instructions for it in my ear. I suppose I’ll do the same if I ever have children, or if I don’t, I’ll find someone I think needs it more than me, and I’ll tell them the secret too._
> 
> _I’m not sure why I shared this. I guess I didn’t want every story about Witch’s Wood to be about a hunter seeing something frightening, when I’m not so sure that Witch’s Wood is really all that evil. Or at least not the witch._

Although the story was interesting enough, one part stood out in particular: The witch had commanded the demon and the demon had broken the compact it had made with the children. Sam felt a slight glimmer of hope. What if the witch truly had the power to command demons to undo a contract? There was, of course, the slight problem that when the demon had undone the contracts, what had been bargained for was taken back. Since Sam’s life had been what Dean’s soul had been sold for, that was a problem, of course. But the witch had also gone out of her way to give the children their wishes anyway, and in a more careful way, if how the wishes had come true were any indication. Perhaps, if they went and spoke with her, maybe she’d help them. Break Dean’s contract for him, and make sure that Sam didn’t drop dead in the process.

It wouldn’t be difficult to convince Dean to drive to Big Bay what with the lore that showed that there had been an historical witch that had a proclivity for lightning and with the recent maybe spontaneous combustion, maybe freak lightning strike victims having been in a dispute with the modern-day rumored witch, Elaine.

Telling Dean that he wanted to speak with the witch rather than hunt her probably wouldn’t go over well. Dean hated witches more than just about anything else, and there was the fact that she’d killed a couple of people. Probably. She had motive, anyway, and maybe the ability.

Sam shut his computer. It was late, and given that Dean wasn’t yet back, Sam could only assume that he’d picked up a woman at the bar. He’d turn up in the morning, more than likely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am aware that I've marked this as a crossover with Stardust. However, in order to accomplish my goal of crafting a story that is largely canon-compliant with both universes, I have to spend a few chapters getting Sam and Dean to where they need to be in order to go on a quest for a star. Bear with me, I promise I'll get there.
> 
> Some trivia:
> 
> The Mining Journal is a real publication that serves the area around Marquette, MI and would likely cover stories about Big Bay, MI (which is a real town). 
> 
> The Huron Mountain Witch Forest (Witch's Wood) exists in the same geographical location as the real-life Huron Mountain Club. The mythology I give to it in this story, however, is entirely fictional.
> 
> The dispute over whether or not to mine in the area surrounding Big Bay is at least partially real, and based on the conflict over the Eagle Mine and its potential to damage to the ecology in the area. (The Huron Mountain Club was among the groups that protested it.)
> 
> Gobbler's Knob is a real place, now called Thomas Rock Scenic Overlook.


	2. To Michigan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sam convinces Dean to go and hunt a possible witch...

Sam was woken to the sound of his brother tripping into the room, disturbing a couple of empty cans of beer. Sam groaned at the noise. A couple of weeks of sleep deprivation made him long to remain dozing in the warm, soft bed.

He forced himself to sit upright. “Morning, Dean.”

Dean grunted and flopped on the other bed. “I think I’m hungover, Sammy.”

Sam’s brows shot up. Given the way his brother had always drank, he was surprised that Dean could get hungover at all.

“Worth it, though, she was awesome,” Dean added without any prompting, and then the odor that clung to his brother hit Sam’s nose.

“Gross, dude, you smell like a hooker,” Sam grumbled. “At least go take a shower, man.” Sam threw a balled up sock at his brother’s head to drive home the point.

Dean lazily swiped it away from his face, but got up and wandered toward the motel bathroom, grumbling about killjoy little brothers as he did.

* * *

By the time Dean had finished washing off the smell of last night’s activities with whatever nameless woman he’d been with, Sam had pulled up the evidence for the case.

“So, while you were out picking up new STDs, I found us a case,” Sam announced.

Dean frowned, becoming somber. “Okay, what is it?”

“A couple of mining scouts were struck by freak lightning and burnt to a crisp after arguing with this woman, Elaine Morgan. Rumor has it that she’s either from a long line of witches, or she’s immortal and has been changing her name periodically. She was in the middle of a dispute with them over mineral rights,” Sam explained, quickly, neglecting to mention anything to do with demons or broken demon contracts. “I did some digging into the history, and there’s a lot of weird reports about the property she owns. It’s even called Witch’s Wood by the locals. Weird, cursed looking creatures, demonic activity, disappearing people. All of that. It goes back to at least the early 1800s, and even the indigenous oral histories suggest that the area is dangerous, so who really knows how long she’s been there.”

“Okay, so where is this that we’re talking about?” Dean asked, rubbing his temples.

“Ah…” Sam thought for a moment and double checked. “Not all that far from Big Bay, Michigan. We could make that drive today, start checking it out by tomorrow. We’ve got witch-killing bullets, already, so we don’t need to get Bobby involved or anything. Probably be in and out before the end of the week.”

“Michigan’s upper peninsula in March? It’s even odds that the roads will be crap, Sam,” Dean grumbled. “I’ll be scrubbing salt off the Impala the whole time.”

“There’s a witch killing people, Dean,” Sam argued, knowing that Dean would acquiesce if he figured that people were in danger. “We can’t ignore that, even for the Impala.”

“I don’t like it,” Dean complained. “I hate witches. I hate messing up my car. But, yeah, you’re right. We’ll nab some bagels or something and get on the road in an hour.”

* * *

The drive had been a long one, and Sam was relieved to finally stretch out his legs when they arrived a full nine hours later. They’d barely stopped at all, and Dean had complained something fierce when they crossed the Mackinac Bridge. He hated tolls, but going north through the lower peninsula had shaved four full hours of driving for the price of a single four dollar toll.

Sam hadn’t crossed this bridge more than three times in his life, and he’d enjoyed looking out over the Straits of Mackinac to the island of the same name, where the famous (and famously haunted) Grand Hotel could be seen through the haze. If it wasn’t so exclusive (requiring formal dress that their FBI threads simply wouldn’t cut it for), maybe he and Dean would have considered taking the ferry across to it and checking the place out. However, Sam was equally certain that his brother could never be convinced to leave the Impala behind on the mainland, as motor vehicles were outlawed on the island.

Regardless, they’d made it to Big Bay, and there was a relatively nice motel located only a short walk from the local diner / general store / laundromat. There was also a bar, creatively named the Lumberjack Tavern, and a restaurant located in the Thunder Bay Inn. Beyond that, there was not that much to the tiny town.

The air was still biting when Sam stepped out into it, and he knew he’d want to haul out a heavier coat if he intended to do a lot of walking.

“There’s still snow everywhere, Sam,” Dean complained, checking the Impala’s undercarriage for evidence of salt residue.

“It’s not that bad,” Sam replied absently. “Most of it’s melted and melting. Besides, we’re not going to be here long. We can find a hunt in the southwest after this.”

Muttering under his breath, Dean led the way into the motel. It was almost entirely empty, so they had their pick of the rooms. The owner was helpful and chatty, and Sam quickly had her on the topic of the two dead men. She was a bit more taciturn about that, and said, “Well, it’s awful what happened to them, don’t get me wrong, but I’m glad that that mine isn’t going to happen now. Wish it could have been stopped some other way, but I can’t help but be glad that I won’t have to worry about my well being poisoned by mine runoff, you know?”

A little more talking had her telling them that the argument that preceded the deaths had occurred outside of the Lumberjack Tavern, which was something they’d already known, but by then she’d gotten their room aired out and wished them a nice stay in Big Bay and there was no good reason for them to continue to press her on the topic.

Sam and Dean exchanged looks, and without a word, they both collapsed into their respective beds. The drive had been long and grueling. Tomorrow they could check out the tavern and see if anyone had witnessed the actual argument and lightning strike.

* * *

The next morning, Sam woke to see that his brother was already awake, and just coming back from somewhere. He was carrying a couple of Styrofoam take-out containers, so he must have retrieved something greasy from the cafe down the road.

“The cafe is pretty good, Sammy,” Dean announced. “I brought you back some grub.”

Sam nodded at his brother as he sleepily stumbled to the rickety little kitchenette table and wordlessly dug into the still warm eggs that Dean had brought back for him. After a few bites, Sam hummed, “You’re right. This is pretty good. You got this from the cafe that’s part of the laundromat and the general store?”

“Yeah! I would never have guessed. Shame that this place is too far off the beaten path to come back to, even for this great food. They’ve got fresh deep-fried beer-battered fish for lunch, too! Definitely will be getting some of that later,” Dean said happily.

Sam opened his mouth to remind Dean that eating all that greasy diner food was horrible for his health, but clamped his jaw shut when he remembered that Dean was going to die by hellhound in a little over a month and cholesterol was unlikely to be a concern. He took another bite of egg instead.

“So, we were headed to the Lumberjack Tavern today, right?” Dean asked.

“Yeah, we should. It’s currently the best and only lead we have, after all,” Sam agreed.

“All right. One problem with that. It doesn’t open until noon. What should we do until then? Seems like a lot of wasted time, just waiting,” Dean pointed out.

Sam nodded and thought for a moment, “I guess we could drive up toward Witch’s Wood, and at least scope the place out. You know, just in case we need to….”

“Gank the witch,” Dean finished for him. “Probably all sorts of horrible blood rites and vivisected rabbits and shit hidden back in that forest.”

“Yeah, that,” Sam muttered. “We should definitely be sure that Ms. Morgan is actually a witch before we break out the witch killer bullets, though.”

“Ah huh,” Dean grumbled. “If you want to wander around a town that may be infested with witches without witch killer bullets, that’s your dumb decision. I’m at least going to keep them on me.”

Sam shook his head but didn’t complain. “All right. We’ll drive up to the end of the road and at least take a look around. See what kind of security Ms. Morgan has.”

* * *

The road to Witch’s Wood was barely more than a two-track gravel road that wound through the thick brush and towering bare trees. In the summer, Sam didn’t doubt that it would be a claustrophobic drive as the trees crowded in and blocked the view in all directions. Even the sky would be lost as the canopy of leaves covered the road entirely.

However, in this early part of spring, the trees were still bare of their leaves, and the gaps in the branches allowed for a little more visibility through the woods. He still despaired at the thought of getting out of the Impala and trying to hike through the stickers and thistles that grew near the road.

A few winding turns later, and the road opened up into a dead end turn-around. A large and comfortable looking guard shack and a crossing gate blocked any further travel up the road onto the private property, and on the trees nearby were pinned signs reading “Private Property - No Trespassing - **NO HUNTING**”.

“No trespassing and no hunting,” Dean read as he shifted the Impala into park. “Guess we’ll be ignoring that, huh, Sammy?”

Sam sighed, and shook his head. Before he could respond there was a shout from the guard shack, and a man in a private security uniform stepped out of it. The uniform included a heavy windbreaker, so clearly the witch wasn’t unreasonable about her employees’ health in cold weather.

Sam shot his brother a harsh look, knowing that Dean would correctly interpret it as: _Shut up and let me talk_.

Dean shrugged in reply and rolled down the window to the driver’s side that the guard had walked up to.

“You gentlemen lost?” said the guard, approaching the Impala cautiously, hand resting casually on the handgun on his belt. “If you were looking to head to Squaw Beach, you took the wrong turn.”

“Yeah,” Sam said quickly, before Dean could say something foolish. “We must have.”

The guard shrugged. “Happens often enough. Roads aren’t marked all too well. You’ll need to turn around and go back about four miles or so, and then turn right at the first crossroads. Not sure you’ll get much of a view today, bit cold and windy by the lake this early in the year, but you might see some freighters.”

“Thanks,” Sam replied. “Sorry about making you get out of your… station?”

“No problem, breaks up the monotony. And it’s a nice day for us Yoopers after all that snow and ice all winter,” the guard said.

“No complaints working for the local witch?” Dean asked, his disdain for witches barely concealed by his faux touristy question.

Sam sputtered. “Dean! That’s…”

But the guard interrupted before Sam could finish telling Dean off for being offensive. “Read those brochures, then? Well, there are worse people to work for than Ms. Morgan, that’s for sure. Definitely better than working for any of the mining companies around, or the shipping industry.” He laughed a little, and then added, a little more seriously. “I know there’s a lot of rumors that fly around these parts, but she’s a good person. She spends a small fortune keeping the watershed around here as pristine as can be, and she was real good to me and my son when my wife passed a couple years back. I think all this witch business is just small-town pettiness. Don’t pay it no mind.”

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Sam said, automatically, in that quiet, serious voice he often used when speaking to victims.

The guard nodded, acknowledging Sam’s concern. “Yeah. Well, you folk best be getting on your way. Daylight’s a-wasting.”

“Yes, sir,” Dean said, rolling up the window and putting the Impala back into gear.

The guard stepped back from the car as Dean steered around the little circle and went back the way that they’d come.

* * *

“I guess taking the road up to the witch’s house isn’t going to be happening,” observed Dean as he carefully navigated the winding road back toward town.

Sam nodded. “No. I guess not. But we should maybe ask around the tavern before we start planning on how to trespass on property owned by a multimillionaire.”

“A multimillionaire witch, Sam,” Dean corrected. “Can you imagine what kind of gross shit a skanky witch could get up to with that kind of money?”

“We don’t actually have any evidence that she’s really a witch,” Sam pointed out. “A freak lightning strike that killed two people is really weird, sure, but I’m not going to kill anyone over it until I’m convinced that it was really because of a hex or something.”

“Hey, this is your witchy case,” Dean shot back. “Why are you being Mr. Skeptic McSkeptic all of a sudden?”

“I dunno, do you wanna accidentally shoot some eccentric woman just because the locals don’t like her and blame her for anything weird that goes down?” Sam grumbled.

“Yeah, yeah.”

* * *

The Lumberjack Tavern was located on the main road into and out of town. Not that there were many other roads to be located on, really.

It was quickly apparent that there wasn’t much by way of tourism this time of the year and that they stuck out like a sore thumb among the locals gathered around the bar. It was also covered in memorabilia from the film _Anatomy of a Murder_, which had apparently been filmed in the little town, about a murder that had actually taken place there. 

Sam and Dean glanced at one another and then split up. Dean strode up to a bunch of brash looking young men, covered in a thin layer of sooty dust that suggested that they were miners. Sam approached the bar, where an elderly man and the bartender were in conversation about the defunct railway that had once run through the local campground up to the equally defunct shipyard near Squaw Beach. It appeared the old man was reminiscing about being an engineer for the train and was deep enough into his beer that he was complaining about how many snow-mobiles had been mangled by his steam-engine.

“Stupid idiots. Never seemed to realize that getting onto that nice packed snow over the tracks is all well and good, but then the engine would come along - ya know - and they couldn’t get the damn thing up over the drifts. Get stuck half on the tracks, and then bail off before I could run ‘em over. The snow mobile would be a total loss and muck up my engine every time. Stupid, stupid.”

The bartender was nodding along to the story with a glazed over look that screamed to Sam that he’d heard this same story a few hundred times over. Noticing a slight lull in the old man’s muttering and Sam’s expectant stare, the bartender interrupted. “Sorry, sir. Seems I’ve got someone else wanting my attention. You want anything else before I go?”

“Nah,” the old man said. “Top off my beer, and I’ll be good.” The bartender fetched a pitcher and topped off the old man’s mug, before hurriedly scurrying to Sam.

“Howdy,” the bartender said. “What can I get you?”

Sam thought for a moment and asked for one of the craft beers with a relatively low alcohol content. He might have been playing at being a tourist, but he was working and it wouldn’t do to get drunk on the job. Although judging from his brother’s raucous laughter, Dean might think differently.

The bartender returned a moment later with a mug of beer for Sam.

“We don’t typically get a lot of tourists this time of the year,” the bartender commented. “Here for the sucker fishing?”

Sam nodded, even though he hadn’t the faintest clue what a sucker was, aside from a kind of fish, given the context. “Yeah, seemed like a good place for it. Out of the way, not as much competition for the best spots, right?”

The bartender shrugged. “I dunno about that. We’ve got some serious fisherman around here, and they’ll guard the best spots. But a lot of streams around here, you’ll probably find some good spots all the same.”

Sam nodded. “We also heard that there was some kind of freak lightning strike a couple weeks ago. Should we be worried about the weather?”

The bartender shook his head. “This is Michigan, and the UP at that. Weather can change on a dime around here, especially so close to the lake. But I’d be more worried about a cold snap than lightning.”

“Yeah, well, my brother’s kinda superstitious. And there’s some ridiculous stuff on the internet about this Morgan woman, and how she was arguing with those men right before they got struck,” Sam said, leaning into the tourist cover.

The bartender frowned. “Well, that’s true enough. Miss Morgan was arguing with them. Not quite sure what about. She’s usually as cool as a cucumber, no matter how much she’s had to drink, and even when they were trying to drive a hard bargain about the mineral rights I never heard her get real angry about anything. But the big guy said something to piss her right off, and she stormed out of here. The mining reps didn’t seem to get the message so they headed right out after her and couldn’t have been three minutes later that there was a big crack of lightning and…”

The bartender trailed off and ran a hand through his grey beard. “Well, I guess it was quick, at any rate. But it sure wasn’t pretty to look at after. The autopsy, I guess, showed that they died pretty much instantly. The lightning boiled their brains, poor bastards.”

“And do you think there’s anything to the rumor of witchcraft?” Sam asked.

The bartender gave Sam a sharp look. “I’ve lived in these parts my whole life, and you sure don’t mess with Witch’s Wood. But if you ask me, I think whatever caused that lightning did this town a favor, be it an act of god or a witch’s hex.”

“Why’s that?” asked Sam.

“That mine would have poisoned the watershed and ruined the fishing and the hunting for miles around,” the bartender said. “I ain’t complaining that it isn’t going to happen. But that’s enough gossip from me. You enjoy your beer.”

* * *

“So,” asked Sam, as he coaxed his slightly intoxicated brother to the car, after quietly filling him in on what he’d learned, “did you find anything out, while you drank some miners under the table?”

“Sure did,” Dean said cheerfully, looking down at the Impala’s keys in his hands with a frown.

“I should drive, Dean.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Dean clumsily tossed the keys to Sam and collapsed into the passenger seat.

Sam climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled out onto the road, heading back to the motel. “So what did you find out?”

“So… the one guy. The one in the blue plaid with the - ah - burn hole in the collar. He was out in the parking lot when it happened. Saw the whole thing.”

“What’d he see?”

“So, Morgan comes out of the tavern looking five shades of pissed off, and starts to get in her car, but she’s so angry she fumbles her keys. Then out comes the mining rep and his goon, and they confront her. Now my guy, he says, he’s a local. Don’t want nothing to do with the witch of Witch’s Wood. ‘Specially when she looks fit to be tied. Apparently, the mining rep is going on about suing over mineral rights or something, while she just starts walking toward the diner, and then the goon says something vaguely threatening. And she just up and loses it. Whirls around and points at them and… BLAM. Crispy critters!”

Sam nodded at this. “Yeah, I’d say that’s pretty definitively witchy.”

“I’d say so,” Dean agreed. “So, I think we take a nap, sober up, and see about hiking to that house.”

“We don’t even know exactly where her house is, Dean,” Sam pointed out. “There’s a quarter million acres of land in Witch’s Wood. That’s a lot of area to cover, and in case you haven’t noticed, it’s still pretty cold for hiking aimlessly.”

“Ah! But that’s were my guys were pretty awesome.” Dean grinned and stretched his legs out under the dash. “So the one in the green ball cap, he likes to fish, see? And he once heard a rumor that the best fishing was on the Pine River inside of Witch’s Wood. So, he went up the river on a little tin boat the one time, ‘cause it’s not trespassing if you are on a navigable river. Apparently he got a big fright. Something about spectral wolves or something, but the point is that at the mouth of the river was the witch’s house.”

Sam considered this, thinking over the county map he’d been looking over on the long drive up from Ohio. “We could hike in along the lakeshore from Squaw Beach. The Pine River’s mouth isn’t too far from there, about ten miles or so along the lakeshore. We’ll probably get there past dark, though, and it’ll be cold with the wind off the lake like that.”

“We’ve got coats, and I bet you that the witch won’t expect anyone to bother her after dark. All the better to catch her off guard,” Dean stated as they pulled into the motel’s empty lot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trivia for this chapter:
> 
> I did in fact look up the weather conditions for mid-March 2008 in Big Bay. The temperature was hovering right around freezing at that time.
> 
> The Mackinac Bridge does in fact charge a toll to cross it. Sam and Dean would have paid $4 to cross the bridge.
> 
> The Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island does play host to a number of [ghost stories](https://www.lorepodcast.com/episodes/91), and it is actually illegal to use motor vehicles on the island (with a tiny number of exceptions for emergency vehicles).
> 
> Cram's General Store / Sleep Hollow Cafe / Big Bay Laundromat is a real place, all run out of the same building, they also offer a driving range and storage units.
> 
> The Lumberjack Tavern really exists, although my description of what it looks like inside is fictionalized as it is the only place in Big Bay that I've described that I have not personally visited.
> 
> The Thunder Bay Inn is also a real place, and the attached restaurant makes one of the finest thin-crust pizzas I've ever had. 
> 
> The road that comes to a dead end at the Huron Mountain Club (here fictionalized as Witch's Wood) really exists, as does the guard shack and the turn around. And I have in fact made that wrong turn on the way to Squaw Beach (also a real place) and have seen it for myself. The guard the speaks with Sam and Dean is entirely fictitious. 
> 
> The trivia about _Anatomy of a Murder_ is true.
> 
> The story about the train running over snowmobiles is true, as I heard it told by the son of the engineer who ran the train. (The old man telling the story here is fictional.) In real life the train no longer runs through Big Bay, and the train tracks have begun to disappear beneath moss and leaf litter.


	3. The Witch of Witch's Wood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sam and Dean meet the witch of Witch's Wood...

It was already starting to get dark by the time that the Impala crunched to a halt in the abandoned gravel parking lot at Squaw Beach. The sky was clear but the wind was almost howling across the vast lake as Sam stepped out, and he shivered into his heavy brown coat. The lake’s white capped waters looked steely gray as it crashed against the old wooden dock that jutted out into the bay.

Sam stared out over the water for a moment, wondering why anyone would ever dismiss Lake Superior as “just a lake”. He was well-educated enough to know that the Great Lakes were freshwater inland seas, and every single one was as dangerous as the open ocean to the ships that sailed them. He also knew, from his research into folklore in general, just how dangerous Lake Superior was in particular. Not only had it been the site of many shipwrecks, it was so cold that it was said that the lake never gave up her dead. There were ghost stories aplenty, and a lake filled with bodies forever lost to the perpetually freezing waters.

The trunk slammed shut behind him, and Sam was pulled from his morbid thoughts.

“You gonna give me a hand with these?” Dean asked, holding out a duffel bag filled with assorted weapons.

“It’s a witch hunt, not a ghost,” Sam pointed out, noticing the presence of the sawed off shotguns.

“Spectral wolves, man,” Dean shot back. “Figure we’d cover our bases here.”

Sam shrugged and accepted the duffel, slinging it across his shoulder.

* * *

The walk along the beach was not a particularly difficult one, although the soil here alternated between sandy and stony. Sam figured he preferred the sand to the rocks, as the stones were loose and rounded by wave action and seemed intent on rolling his ankle with every misjudged step.

He envied his brother’s heavier boots now, as they provided better ankle stability than Sam’s sneakers. They were probably warmer, too.

The wind was biting, and although entering the woods would have blocked some of that, the trees swayed and creaked ominously. A thunderous crash suggested that the wind was strong enough to blow down some of the more rotted trees. It seemed like an insulting way to die, after facing down demons, werewolves, vampires and even a Trickster god, to be crushed by a blown over tree. So neither Sam or Dean suggested seeking refuge from the relentless wind beneath the trees.

All the same, they were making good time, and quickly crossed the barely marked boundary between the public beach and Witch’s Wood. (A few NO TRESPASSING signs was all that existed to suggest that they were stepping onto the property.)

Sam winced, though, the moment they crossed over the boundary. The air felt different here, although he’d have been hard pressed to say exactly how. If Dean had noticed and asked, he might have tentatively said that the air felt heavier somehow, more oppressive, but Dean had been leading the way and didn’t notice Sam’s momentary flinch. 

Sam shook it off. It was likely just a bit of misplaced anxiety. It wasn’t to do with his defunct psychic powers. Those were gone and they were not coming back. It was just all the slightly insane stories that he’d read about this place. Everything from spectral animals to demonic presences - it seemed to run the gambit.

* * *

The sun set an hour or so later and the temperature plummeted. Sam tucked his hands into his jacket as best he could, but he couldn’t seem to get warm. He could only be thankful that the wind had finally died down, and there was only a gentle slosh of water against the shoreline, barely visible in their flashlights’ beams as they continued to march along.

Dean was cursing up ahead, the bitterness of the air a stark contrast to the puffs of steam from Dean’s grumbling.

Sam tried to think now that they seemed to be nearing their destination. He’d convinced Dean to come all this way so that he could speak with a possibly white witch (this one set of murders notwithstanding) who could break a demon contract. Of course, he hadn’t told Dean that, so here they were loaded down with a small mobile armory, so that Dean could shoot and kill Sam’s best lead.

Perhaps he hadn’t planned this out that well, but he’d gotten caught up in confirming that Elaine Morgan was a witch and ended up discovering that she almost certainly had murdered two men in cold blood. So here he was, shivering and walking along a beach to sneak up on her home with a gun filled with witch killing bullets.

Maybe when they actually found her, maybe he could just stop Dean from shooting her. Maybe she’d be willing to listen to him, even after his brother tried to kill her. Or perhaps he should knock Dean out now, and go on ahead without him?

Dean suddenly flicked off his flashlight. Sam did the same immediately.

“What?” he hissed into the darkness.

The shadowy figure that was his brother motioned up ahead. There was a campfire not far from the water’s edge. Barely illuminated by the firelight and the full moon, Sam could make out a wide river’s mouth pouring into Superior, and across that was the fire and a figure sitting in the sand nearby. It was difficult to tell at this distance and in the dark, but the figure looked small and feminine.

Dean grabbed his elbow and whispered, “We should get into the tree line until we cross that river. We’re too easy to spot out here. Probably lucky that she’s looking the other way. Hope she didn’t see our flashlights. What kinda skanky witch wants to sit on a beach in this kind of weather anyway? She’s got a house.”

Sam shrugged at his brother’s complaints but followed him into the trees. It was difficult going without the flashlights, but they’d had enough pseudo-military survivalist training to manage, although Sam was certain that he’d be picking burs off his clothing for weeks after this.

They did have the good fortune of finding a massive log down across the river, so they could very carefully cross that without wading through and getting soaked to the bone.

Creeping up to the firelight was relatively easy. The forest encroached close to the beach, and the woman was sitting facing the lake with her back to the trees and to the hunters approaching her.

Dean pulled his handgun and began to line up a shot. Sam swatted his wrist and quickly whispered, “Gotta make sure it’s Morgan.”

Sam didn’t need to be able to see his brother’s face to know that he was rolling his eyes at this. “Who else would it be?”

Sam didn’t answer.

“Hello, gentlemen.”

The woman had turned at the sound of their nearly silent whispering and was now looking back at them.

Dean’s gun shot back up.

The woman’s surprised blink was apparent even by firelight.

“I take it that you two are the young Hunters that were bothering Mark earlier today. I assumed that at least one of your sort would be around sooner or later, given that I was… indiscreet recently,” she continued.

“Indiscreet? Is that what you call killing two men?” Dean growled.

She turned back toward the campfire. “I lost my temper. I’ll freely admit it. But before you shoot me, you should at least hear what set me off so badly.”

Sam frowned. Normally, this would be when the witch tried to hex them and flee. This passive acceptance of potentially being shot either suggested that she didn’t fear a witch-killing bullet or that she figured she might deserve it. Either way, it was unsettling. Even shoot-first, ask-questions-later Dean was hesitating.

“It was a dispute over mining and mineral rights, wasn’t it?” Sam finally asked, tentatively.

“You can come sit by the fire,” the woman said. “You might as well. I assume you walked all the way here, and it hasn’t been warm today.”

Sam paused for only a moment before stepping out onto the damp sand and sitting down on a bone white log near the fire. Dean followed a few seconds later, looking at Sam in disbelief.

The woman, Elaine Morgan, looked over at them from where she was sitting in the sand. It couldn’t have been comfortable. The sand was visibly damp, and her blue jeans looked like they had sopped up some of that water. Her jacket was relatively light for the cold night, and she looked a little disheveled with her light brown hair only messily pulled back into a ponytail.

“Yes, the argument was about mining rights. This place is mine to protect because it’s special, and not just because it’s almost entirely untouched by any developments, and I’ve been doing so for a very long time. I don’t doubt that you’ve researched enough to know that,” Elaine spoke, returning her gaze to the waves that gleamed in the moonlight. “But that wasn’t what made me lose my temper.”

Dean snorted, “What could possibly justify frying someone with lightning?”

“There’s a lot of money to be had in mining this property and the surrounding watershed, so they were starting to threaten me. Which is fine, I’m pretty sure I would be fine. Unless they have Hunters on their payroll, and I know for a fact that they don’t,” Elaine said, picking up a small clam shell and turning it over in her palm.

“So if them trying to threaten you into compliance didn’t set you off, what did?” Sam asked.

“You met Mark. He has a son, and since Mark works long hours for me, I usually let him entertain Ryan in the guard station, or sometimes I babysit. He’s a sweet kid, but he’s only seven and very human. And, sadly, I’d never thought I’d need to pretend that I don’t care about Ryan’s well-being. So, when threats on my person didn’t have any effect, they started threatening Mark and Ryan, and others in my employ as well. And… that was what set me off. They threatened to hurt a child!” Thunder rolled ominously, somewhere in the distance. But Elaine simply took a deep breath and no storm materialized.

Dean was silent, looking taken aback by this explanation, and he tucked his handgun away. “So that’s what Gus saw. You trying to remove yourself from the situation before you blew, and a couple of idiots not backing off when you told them to.”

Elaine smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Ah, Gus. I wondered if he saw. I’d recorded that meeting, you know, on my phone. I was going to use the conversation to get a cease and desist order put on them, but… that last threat just… I couldn’t. I was so angry. So I called down lightning.”

She tossed the shell away. It plopped into the waves and disappeared. “So. Now that you’ve heard my tale, what are you going to do with me? I’d prefer to continue living, but I’ll understand if my crime is too great for you to overlook.”

“You’d just let us execute you?” Sam asked in surprise.

Elaine shrugged. “No, I think I’d probably fight back. I’d try not to kill you. You’re only doing your job. Same as I was doing mine.”

“Do you have that recording?” Dean asked, sharply. “’Cause the way I figure it, if you stopped a couple of bastards from killing a kid, we’re probably good. Might freak me the hell out how you did it, but I ain’t gonna complain that you did.”

Elaine reached into her jacket pocket and handed over her extremely expensive phone, the first indication other than her vast tracts of land that she was wealthy.

The recording was easy to find, and it had on it exactly what she had said. The mining rep and his associate (who sounded an awful lot like hired muscle) threatened blackmail and bodily harm to Elaine, who brushed them off and warned that she was going to sue them for everything they were worth if they continued to harass her. There was sounds of her moving and a door slamming. Then sounds of keys clinking together before the sound of metal clattering to cement a few moments later. The mining rep and his goon’s voices reappeared and the threats they made escalated, promising to hurt “that guardsman’s kid”, until there was a shouted Latin word, and a thunderclap that must have been deafening. The recording distorted on it and then cut off altogether.

Sam shut the phone and handed it back to Elaine, who tucked it back in her pocket, before asking, “Well?”

“We’re good,” Dean said, decisively.

“That’s it?” Sam asked in disbelief. Dean’s hatred of witches was legendary, and if he wasn’t seeing this with his own two eyes, he wouldn’t have believed it at all.

“Yeah, that’s it.”

Sam sputtered for a moment, as Dean got up.

“I guess we should be going, seeing as we don’t need to gank you,” Dean said bluntly.

Elaine nodded, “If you like. But I got the strongest sense that your brother has something he wanted to ask me.”

Dean froze. “Why would Sam… Sam. Sam, why do you want to talk with a witch?”

“So… when I was looking through the lore, there was this story,” Sam began, sheepishly, knowing he was caught out. “Where, ah, Emma Morgan got into a dispute with a demon over a deal it made with some local kids, and she sent it back to hell and broke the contract. She even granted the kids their wishes, even though she didn’t have to. That was you, wasn’t it?”

Elaine got to her feet and brushed some of the sand from her pants. “I know the story, yes, and I did go by Emma for a time.”

“Is it true, did you break a demon’s deal?” Sam asked, excited to finally see a light at the end of this horrible tunnel that he’d been living in ever since he’d come back and found out what the price for his resurrection had been.

“There’s a truth to the story,” Elaine said, sounding ever so slightly evasive. “But the deal wasn’t with a demon, and it was a good bit easier to break because of that.”

“Oh,” Sam hadn’t realized how much hope he’d pinned on Elaine until she said that it wasn’t a demon, and now his throat felt tight and warm.

“I am sorry,” Elaine spoke quietly. There was real regret in her apology. “Ah… I didn’t catch your names?”

“Sam Winchester,” Sam managed to croak out, “and that’s my brother, Dean.”

There was the briefest flash of a strange expression across Elaine’s face at their names. “If I might ask why you’re interested in that story?”

“It’s nothing,” Dean grumbled. “Academic interest.”

Elaine stepped around the fire and snatched Dean’s wrist, glaring at his palm.

“No. No it is not. There’s a contract on your soul, Dean Winchester, and it’ll be due within a matter of a couple months.” Elaine looked up at Dean’s face as she released his wrist. He pulled back from her immediately, rubbing his wrist.

She whirled around so that she was addressing Sam. “I do know several spells that can cancel out a contract, but all but… oh, about four… would sacrifice the thing gained by the contract in the first place. Would that be a problem?”

“Hell yeah, it’d be a freaking problem!” Dean shouted.

Elaine remained silent, clearly waiting for clarification, and uncertain what kind of thing would be worth risking eternal damnation for.

“The deal was to bring me back to life,” Sam explained, tiredly. “What about the four that wouldn’t, ah, you know, kill me?”

“Very black magic, for the most part,” Elaine spoke sharply. “I’m not sure I’d be willing to perform them, even if you were willing to allow me to do so.”

“So, I’m still shit out of luck,” Dean said. “Great. Good chat. Come on, Sam. We should get out of here.”

“No,” Sam snapped. “You said mostly. Is there one that isn’t black magic?”

“Yes,” Elaine said. “There is one, but…”

She seemed to freeze as her eyes were drawn to a bright flash in the sky above. A falling star was blazing across the sky, coming from the northeast across the water and heading to the southwest, into the forest. The Winchesters watched it as well. It was a massive fireball, absolutely awe-inspiring to view.

“It required something I wasn’t expecting to occur,” she finished distractedly as the star disappeared below the tree-line.

Sam gave her his best hopeful puppy-dog eyes.

“Ah… yes,” she said. “So, that fallen star. I can tell that it landed. It’s the very thing that I would need to work the piece of magic that could free your brother from his contract. Otherwise the best I could have offered was sanctuary here. It wouldn’t have stopped him from being damned, but it would have extended his life. Hellhounds and demons cannot come onto my property. But I suspect that was not what you wanted. A cage is still a cage, no matter how comfortable or large.”

She shook her head. “But that’s neither here nor there anymore. If you two can retrieve that star for me, I can help. With a little luck, of course. This kind of white magic does have an element of luck to it.”

“A lump of space rock is gonna make it possible for you to break a demon contract?” Dean asked in clear disbelief.

Elaine began to walk toward her house, which stood nestled in the trees some distance down the beach. “It has power, a rather great deal of it, and with it, I am quite certain that the deal can be made null and void.”

Sam got to his feet and began striding after her, his long legs eating up the distance between himself and the witch. “Yeah, I’m sure we can fetch it for you. But it might take a bit of time and work to figure out where it landed. There’s got to be miles and miles of mostly uninhabited land between here and wherever it touched down. It shouldn’t be extremely difficult, just time consuming.”

Elaine paused briefly, making a swift sweeping motion with her hand, and the roaring bonfire blew out like a candle. “You should both follow me inside. It’s cold.” She continued walking, briskly, not waiting to see if Dean had decided to join her.

Sam glanced back toward the few glowing embers that illuminated his brother. Dean seemed indecisive, but whatever he saw in Sam’s face seemed to decide it for him. Dean swore and hurried to catch up.

Relieved that Dean was, however reluctantly, joining him in this endeavor, despite the presence of a witch, Sam rejoined Elaine as she trudged through the damp sand toward her home.

Another sweeping gesture, this time at eye level, had the lighting within the house spring to life. Sam was a little shocked by the casual way she used magic, if he was quite honest with himself. As a hunter, he’d never once seen magic used for any reason that wasn’t in the service of locating someone, harming someone, or performing a counter-curse.

On another day, if Dean’s life wasn’t in jeopardy, he might have been more curious and asked all about these everyday magicks. However, today was not the day to entertain his academic side.

The house was more rustic than Sam would have expected from a witch with millions or billions of dollars of disposable income. It looked like a slightly more polished cabin, with lacquered oak making up much of the decor, as well as the walls and ceilings, although the flooring seemed to be made of some kind of polished black stone. He ran his hands over the minimally reshaped branch that made up the handrail for the stairwell, leading up to the second floor. The wood felt smooth to the touch.

Elaine didn’t pause but continued down a hallway toward the back of the house. Sam guessed that she wanted them to follow and ignored his slight twinge of hunter paranoia about following a witch into the seat of her power.

The hallway led into a kitchen filled with very modern stainless-steel appliances mixed with older alchemical supplies scattered across the counters. To Elaine’s credit, with the possible exception of some suspicious green and black fluids in sealed jars, there was nothing incriminating or obviously gory. There were plenty of dried flowers and herbs, a couple of vials of blood - labeled in grease pen as _B. taurus_ and _O. virginianus_ \- and a variety of small lake smoothed stones. The chalk marks on the kitchen were a mixture of runic and Enochian symbols, but Sam didn’t see any symbols or any combination of symbols that was obviously demonic.

She swept in with the confidence of someone who could navigate this room in complete darkness, and began opening cabinets, rummaging for odds and ends that Sam couldn’t immediately identify the purpose of.

As she gathered supplies, she resumed speaking, “If what you were seeking was a meteorite that fell upon this world, I have absolutely no doubt that you and your brother could retrieve it without any trouble, but I’m afraid that you’ve misunderstood the nature of this place. Witch’s Wood is something of a cross-roads, where the boundaries between realms are thin. The star fell upon another realm entirely, and you’ll need to venture there to obtain it.”

A candle with black wax was set upon a clean portion of the counter, along with a large armful of MREs that looked like they may have been newly issued at some indeterminate time that could have been as early as the eighties or as recently as a few years before.

“Pack the food away,” she ordered, “it’s possible that you’ll be needing it, and I’m afraid nothing really keeps like these. I presume there’s room in those weapons’ bags for supplies.”

Dean scooped the MREs into his bag without complaint, although the look he shot Sam was definitely one of mild confusion. Why would a witch have a fairly substantial portion of a pallet of MREs in her kitchen anyway?

As if reading Dean and Sam’s minds, she sighed and explained, “The winters are harsh here, and my home is very isolated. I find it wise to have enough preserved food on hand to last the winter, in the event that I am unable to get to town and resupply.”

This satisfied Dean, who began packing the excess into Sam’s duffel.

“What kind of ‘other realm’ did the meteorite fall on?” Sam asked.

“A magical one,” Elaine answered, shuffling through a large pile of pale translucent rocks. “You might call it Faerie. Or a part of Faerie, at any rate. You should tread carefully there.” She must have found what she was looking for because she snatched up two small stones, barely larger than a penny, and set them upon her kitchen island, scrubbing away some of the chalk markings with a towel.

Immediately, she pulled a piece of purple chalk from her pocket and scribbled a series of markings onto the countertop in concentric circles. Into the center of the circle went the two stones. There was no incantation as she passed her hands over them, but they glowed pale gold for a moment, and when the glow faded the markings on the countertop were gone. The stones now had a small hole bored through them and a piece of sturdy leather cord threaded through them.

She held the stones out to Sam and Dean. “I can’t help you very much, because my power seems to be tied to this place, but I can provide you with a Babylon candle and these protective amulets.”

Sam took the stone from her without suspicion, although he did examine it. The stone was about the size of a penny in diameter, and smooth like all the lake stones. It was mostly pale grey but had veins of metal that glimmered as he rolled it between his fingers. It was a copper agate, he realized, which were extremely rare and found only in a single gravel pit near one of the copper mines in the area. He tied the leather cord so that he could wear it like a necklace, as he used to with the anti-possession charm before he’d gotten his tattoo.

Dean wrapped his around his wrist, so that it looked like a bracelet.

“What’s a Babylon candle for?” Dean asked.

“It is a method of travel in Faerie,” she replied. “One lights the candle and holds in their mind a destination, be it a place or person or object, and the candle’s light will transport you there in the blink of an eye. It will work so long as your destination lies within Faerie, and you’re within Faerie before you light it.”

Elaine paused and sharply tapped the candle with her outstretched finger, her voice taking on a sharper tone, “I caution you that it is not without dangers. For one, this candle isn’t likely to have more than two, maybe three, uses left in it. But more importantly, when transporting two or more people it is absolutely essential that all parties think of the exact same destination. Thinking of different places can have unexpected results, and there isn’t enough candle left for unanticipated detours.”

“So, if Sam and I hang onto one another, light this thing, and think about this shooting star, the candle will take us straight to it, no searching necessary?” Dean asked, gesturing to the magic candle.

“That is the idea, yes,” Elaine agreed. “And it is paramount that you reach the star quickly; they are valuable in Faerie and there will be others that will mean to take it for themselves.”

She drummed her fingers against the counter. “I feel as if I’m forgetting something.”

“Um, how about how we cross from this realm to Faerie?” Sam inquired.

She shook her head, “That’s simple enough, and it’s not what I’ve forgotten.” She turned in a circle looking at her many supplies and ingredients. Then she snapped her fingers. “Right! You’ll be needing Faerie currency. I’ll be just a moment.” And she rushed out of the kitchen, only to return a minute later carrying a couple of coin pouches.

She handed one to Sam and the other to Dean, who immediately opened his to check inside.

“Is this gold?” Dean asked in surprise.

“Gold, silver, copper. A few valuable gemstones,” Elaine said dismissively. “It’ll be enough for supplies and lodging, in the event that I’ve miscalculated the number of journeys left in the candle.”

“That’s a possibility?!” Dean barked, looking at the candle in suspicion.

Elaine shrugged. “This kind of magic is not an exact science.”

Sam reached out and cautiously picked the candle up off the counter. “You didn’t say how to get to Faerie from here, still.”

She nodded absently. “Yes. It’s simple enough to do, but it will require a bit of walking. The crossing point isn’t far. If you’ll follow me.”

Without further ado, she marched out of the kitchen and toward the front door of the house, which led out into the woods and the long driveway that headed toward town. She snatched up a heavy winter coat from a coat rack as she walked by, and the three were soon out the door and into the chilly night.

She led them down the driveway until just before the bridge that crossed the river. (Sam and Dean exchanged a look as they realized that they hadn’t needed to risk crossing that fallen tree.) Before the crossing, she turned aside and began walking down a small dirt footpath that ran along the river. It was pitch black away from the house’s porch lights, but before either Winchester could pull their flashlights out, Elaine snapped her fingers (Sam flinched at the sound) and a ball of light appeared to float just above them. It illuminated the path and the trees around them in all directions for fifteen or so feet, and followed them as they walked.

Sam could see that Dean was fidgeting with his gun again. He reached over and swatted his wrist. “Knock it off, Dean,” Sam hissed.

Dean glared but stopped fidgeting.

A good quarter mile into the forest, she turned to climb up the river bank, using the roots of a massive oak tree as steps. At the top of the river bank she came to a stop.

“Here,” she said, pointing to some ancient masonry that formed a dull grey wall about five feet high, weathered and hidden by the brush and trees. It ran along the river bank as far as the eye could see to the south (which wasn’t far in the dark and in the dense forest) and turned sharply at the pine to run west off into the forest. There was a gap a few feet wide tucked between the pine that Elaine was leaning against and an equally massive maple.

On the other side of the wall was a meadow, which seemed incongruous in the dense Michigan forest, and then smaller birch trees on the far side, dimly seen in the witchlight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As you can see, I've finally gotten you to where I can start merging the canon events of season 3 of Supernatural with a version of the events in Stardust. I do hope that I haven't lost too many of you with my short bit of case-fic to get you here.
> 
> Trivia for this chapter:
> 
> Lake Superior is a truly massive body of water and it does have plenty of folklore surrounding it. I recommend "Haunted Lakes: Great Lakes Ghost Stories, Superstitions and Sea Serpents" by Frederick Stonehouse if you want to know more about Lake Superior's ghost stories, and I recommend checking out [the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum's website](https://www.shipwreckmuseum.com/) if you want to learn a little about the many shipwrecks that have occurred in Lake Superior and the other Great Lakes. [And yes, Lake Superior tends to not give up her dead. ](http://www.seagrant.umn.edu/newsletter/2007/02/lake_superior_holds_onto_her_dead_and_her_toxaphene.html)
> 
> The vials of blood that Elaine has in her home come from domestic cow and white-tail deer.
> 
> The copper agates might look like this:  



	4. Into Faerie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sam and Dean get a feel for the kind of world they'll be travelling in, pick up a map, and light the Babylon candle.

“On the other side of the wall is Faerie,” Elaine said. “It would be wise to only cross at the gap, and not try to jump over the wall. I’m not sure what would happen but I’m quite certain that it would be very unpleasant.”

“That’s it?” Dean asked, approaching the gap with his hand on his gun. “Just step through the gap and we’re in Faerie.”

“Yes.”

“It does seem a bit unlikely,” Sam agreed. “How’d this ever come to be here?”

Elaine shrugged. “Probably the same way a Devil’s Gate happened to come to be in Wyoming. I don’t question this place too deeply. I just try to keep people from stumbling into things they aren’t prepared for and getting hurt in the process.”

However strange it was, Sam truly did believe that this was the only viable option for saving Dean from Hell, so he ignored his misgivings and stepped across the gap. Nothing happened. The meadow remained a meadow, and the grass tickled at his calves, now damp with dew, but nothing else changed. He looked back and could still see over the wall, and it was clear that Elaine and Dean could still see him.

“If I may give you one more piece of advice before you depart for the star,” Elaine said, offhandedly. “You should hike a mile along the trail that leads through that little woods there and find the town that is called Market. For some reason Babylon candles don’t like to take people too close to the Wall, or the Gap, so you’ll need to aim somewhere else on your return journey, and the Market or just outside of Market, is a good place for that.”

“What happens to people that try to come back directly to the Wall, or this meadow?” Sam asked.

Elaine grimaced. “You’re both hunters. I suppose you may have had occasion to see what happens to a person if you run them through a wood-chipper?”

Dean gulped as he crossed the gap too. “Don’t come back to this meadow by candle, got it.”

“One final instruction, and this is essential that you remember. When you return with the star, one of you should fetch me from my home, and I will meet you and the star on the other side of the wall. You must not, under any circumstance, cross the wall with the star.” Elaine then nodded to them. “Good luck, to the both of you.”

* * *

The hike into the town Elaine had said was called Market took the Winchesters around thirty minutes to complete and was done by the surprisingly ample light of the moon. For whatever reason, as they walked through the birch trees, the air began to warm until their coats became uncomfortable and Sam found himself shedding his outermost layers and balling them up on top of the MREs in his bag. The trees soon began to have leaves on them, quite unlike the trees in Witch’s Wood, which were entirely bare of any kind of greenery, the pine trees aside. The landscape was somewhat less hilly, and the hike was easier for it.

However, even as the weather warmed and spring seemed to move into the early stages of summer based on the color of the leaves Sam observed on the trees around them, Sam sensed another change from Witch’s Wood. Witch’s Wood had a certain heaviness in the air, but Faerie was somehow even worse. It had a flavor to it, almost, richer by far than any Sam had ever encountered. Sam recognized it now as a kind of magic, that seemed to infuse everything from the air he was breathing to the ground beneath his feet and the branches that brushed up against him as he walked. It was very different from the sort that he’d encountered often enough with his brother while hunting, but not so different that he couldn’t recognize its touch against his skin. Not nearly as slimy or oily feeling as what he had associated with most witches and demons, nor the cold feeling he got near ghosts. It was simply there. Ubiquitous, ever-present, but unmistakable.

Elaine’s insistence that the entire realm was magical made a good deal of sense now.

* * *

A mile didn’t take terribly long to hike, not even in the dark and with the oppressive atmosphere that Sam could not shake, but Dean seemed either oblivious to, or unwilling to mention. So it was only a short time later that they crested a little hill and discovered a walled town lit by lanterns and gaslight settled at its base.

Dean came to an outright halt and just stared at it for several minutes, before glancing over to Sam. “Dude, since when did towns come with freaking walls?”

Sam was a little dumbfounded, too, if he was honest with himself. He’d read a lot while at Stanford and watched a lot of documentaries, all about things that were not related to hunting or mythology or folklore, so he recognized in a vague way that walled towns were not an unheard of thing. However, they were not something you would find in North America - excluding a very small number in Mexico. “It’s more common in Europe,” Sam finally said, wondering to himself what that meant about the culture of Faerie, if they built their towns with defensive walls.

“Well,” said Dean straightening up a bit and adjusting his duffel bag, “let’s go get a lay of the land, huh?”

Sam wasn’t sure if entering Market was the best idea, but Dean’s tone of voice had suggested that he was going to go check out the town regardless of Sam’s opinion and it was probably better for everyone all around if he just followed his brother.

* * *

Market felt like walking through a very convincing, if magical, Renaissance Festival. The buildings were all very old-fashioned, so much so that Sam was absolutely certain that no such buildings had ever been built in the Americas, their time already having passed before Europeans had ever “discovered” the continents on the western hemisphere. Almost all of the buildings were made exclusively of wood and many of them had thatched roofs. Many of them looked like they’d been cobbled together in an entirely haphazard sort of way, with crooked windows and doors. The entire building leaning a little into the street, or onto the building next to it.

There were no electric lights anywhere, not that Sam had seen, and everything was lit by lanterns or tiny witchlights. The streets were filled with people, despite the late hour, and most of them were dressed to match the architecture. The women all wore dresses, that resembled the sort that Sam recalled from old medieval paintings. Low-cut but with a high waist, probably corseted. The men wore something that resembled suits but weren’t. They had on light wool or leather jackets, over what looked like loosely fitted vests, and under that Sam spotted what looked like very loose linen shirts. Thankfully, there were no Robin Hood style tights anywhere, or he was sure his brother would have never shut up about it. In fact, although their blue jeans probably stood out, they were likely the least abnormal thing about what he and his brother were wearing, compared to what he was seeing.

It was an additional relief to realize that the people all looked human enough, even if they were wearing clothes that looked like it came out of a BBC period piece set sometime during the reign of Elizabeth I and seemed awfully comfortable around magic.

If Sam hadn’t been worried about his brother getting trigger happy around some of the merchandise displayed by the street vendors, he could have been happily intrigued by the clear influence of medieval Europe on this part of Faerie, and how it was possible when it was connected to a wilderness area of the midwestern United States and not to Europe at all.

Sam startled as an elephant trumpeted at his elbow, and he looked down in order to see a man scuttering past with a tiny elephant with a head on each end in a wicker bird’s cage. “Sorry, sorry!”

“Weird,” Dean commented, watching the impossible creature go by.

Sam nodded, speechless.

“So, I was thinking,” Dean began, hustling Sam along with an arm thrown over his shoulder, “if Elaine was wrong about the candle and we get stuck someplace. We should probably try to buy a map. Seeing as I bet our GPS is gonna be worse than useless here.”

This was an excellent suggestion, and Sam was surprised that he hadn’t thought of it himself. “Yeah. That’s probably a good idea.”

“Hey, miss!” Dean suddenly called out to one of the vendors, a relatively young woman in a dull yellow dress. She looked up at him and gave him a skeptical look. Their plaid patterned shirts had never stuck out more.

Dean either didn’t notice or pretended that he didn’t and gave her his most charming smile. Sam fought the urge to sigh.

The woman responded to the smile and Dean’s ridiculous flirting, and after a bit of prompting from Sam, pointed them in the direction of a cartographer’s shop. Sam thanked her earnestly and then all but dragged Dean away, before he could try to get her number, or whatever the equivalent was in this weird backwards place.

* * *

The cartographer’s shop was surprisingly open, despite the fact that it had to be well past two in the morning, and the owner had been helpful if a bit terrifying. Not because he was inhuman or anything, but because he kept muttering about the inherent difficulty of mapping a land in which the geography had a disconcerting habit of rearranging itself every few decades.

“Not a lot,” he had said. “Just around the edges a bit, but it’s dreadfully difficult to not have a few inaccuracies.”

The looks on Sam and Dean’s faces must have betrayed their discomfort with the idea of being in a place where geography wasn’t even a stable concept.

“Oh, just stay out of the areas in grey ink and you’ll be fine,” he said, exchanging the map of the kingdom of Stormhold for a number of silver and copper coins. Sam felt certain that he was fleecing them a bit but didn’t know enough about the currency to say as much.

“Um, what about these?” asked Dean, pointing at a sketch of a serpent-like dragon creature tucked at the base of a mountain range on the outer edge of the map.

The mapmaker just laughed and ushered them out of the shop, locking the door behind them.

* * *

Apparently the town of Market was finally settling in for the night, for the last of the street vendors was finishing packing away their wares and few people were on the street.

Sam tucked the map into his shirt’s breast pocket, folding the thick parchment carefully.

“Let’s light this candle?” Dean said with a sardonic smile that made it clear he was referencing a movie.

Sam rolled his eyes, “Just remember, we have to make sure we think about the exact same thing when we light this, or else we might end up somewhere unexpected and dangerous.”

Dean shrugged, pulling his lighter from his pocket and flicking it open but not sparking it. “Think fallen star?”

Sam rolled his eyes and shot his brother a disappointed bitch face. This was serious, and Dean was treating it like a joke. It was more serious than their typical hunt, even, as this was probably their best shot at freeing Dean from his demon contract.

“This could actually work, Dean,” he snapped. “Don’t joke.”

Dean frowned and shook his head. “Yeah, I know, Sammy. I was serious, though. Unless you got a better way to think about where we’re going. I don’t want to picture a rock and end up going to the wrong place, ya know?” He paused for just an instant and added, “Besides, there’s really no guarantee that the witch is actually gonna live up to her end of this. You shouldn’t get your hopes up too much, just in case this ends up going sideways.”

“It’ll work. She’ll manage it, I’m sure,” Sam said, although he had to admit that he really didn’t have any reason to think this. He was getting desperate and grasping at straws, he knew it, but he couldn’t very well admit it, or else the crushing fear of losing his brother again might just overwhelm him. “But I guess you’re right about picturing the shooting star when we light this. It’s about as foolproof as we’re going to get.”

Dean snapped the lighter open and shut, open and shut, clearly impatient.

Sam resisted the urge to swat it out of his hands, and instead began rummaging in his worn bag until he found where the candle was. He held it up, gripping Dean’s forearm tightly. “Think of the shooting star.”

Dean already had a look of deep concentration as he sparked the lighter and held the resulting flame to the candle’s wick. “Yeah. Shooting star.”

The candle’s wick lit. There was a brief moment where the tiny drop of flame appeared perfectly mundane, yellow-orange with a blackened wick at its heart. The wax was already dark but darkened even further as it began to melt under the heat from the little flame. Both Sam and Dean thought furiously of the streak of silvery-white light that had briefly fallen across the sky above Lake Superior, waiting for the promised magic to work.

They didn’t have to wait more than a couple of breaths for the calm to be broken by a white light that surrounded them, originating from the candle-flame, so bright that neither of them could see anything at all.

Sam’s stomach lurched as he had the strangest sensation of movement pulled on him, not unlike riding an elevator, if the elevator was also a rollercoaster traveling at speeds even a military jet couldn’t match. It stopped as quickly as it began, the light fading out to nothing, but there was a lingering bit of momentum, it seemed, because they both crashed into one another and then into the ground in a tangle of limbs.

The candle’s brilliant flash had also completely destroyed Sam’s night vision, so he did not immediately realize that he had not just landed and fallen half on his brother, but that they had knocked into a stranger. Not until he heard his brother yelp, and an unfamiliar voice growl, “Get off of me!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since the first few chapters were already fairly polished and could have been one massive introductory chapter, I posted all of them today.
> 
> From here on out, I intend to post a chapter at a time. Possibly once or twice a week. I won't commit to any particular schedule, because I can almost guarantee that I will end up not adhering to it. I do promise that this story is complete. It just needs some editing and polishing before I post the rest of the chapters.


	5. The Star

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Dean find the star, and realize that they may have misunderstood precisely what they were looking for.

Sam rapidly shrugged off all his gear and leaped to his feet, drawing his gun from his waistband as he did. His eyes were beginning to adjust to the dim light from the moon above and the sputtering fire in some of the surrounding pine trees.

Dean had fallen directly on a dark-haired man in a silver tunic and pants, with a large diamond on a golden chain around his neck, who was glaring ineffectually at Dean as he struggled to his feet, clearly wanting away from the stranger as much as the stranger wanted away from him.

“Sorry, dude,” Dean grumbled. “Didn’t mean to… ah… land on you?”

“Yes, because all my evening needed was to be knocked to the ground by flying buffoons,” the man snapped, sitting up awkwardly.

Sam figured his brother had the stranger well in hand, especially when he realized that the stranger was sitting oddly because one of his legs was clearly broken. Sam was just about to ask if the man was all right when he noticed where they were standing. They were in the bottom of a bowl shaped indention in the earth, the ground was still warm beneath his feet and the stone was black and melted looking. Spinning around to get a 360 view of the area, he saw that the trees that were on fire seemed to have their tops knocked out of them, like something had fallen out of the sky, breaking them off as it went.

They were very definitely standing in an impact crater. A very recent one.

Distantly, he had heard Dean ask the man if he was all right, and the man snarled right back, “Do I look all right to you?”

Before Dean could answer the stranger, Sam excitedly burst out: “This is a crater!”

Dean startled at Sam’s outburst, instantly pulling his gun and looking around for the threat before Sam’s words registered, and he began looking around for the meteorite instead.

Although they were nearly dead center in the crater, there was no evidence of a large lump of space rock anywhere.

“Hey, dude!” Dean shouted at the man, after a few minutes of searching around the center of the crater with Sam. “Did you happen to see where the fallen star went? It’s gotta be here somewhere.”

The stranger seemed equally annoyed and amused by Dean’s question. “Yes, that is where it fell.” The man pointed to an especially glossy bit of melted stone right at the very center of the crater. “You see, this strange gemstone came flying out of nowhere and knocked it from the sky, and it fell just there.” He pointed to the ground beneath himself and added, “And this is where it was knocked off its feet by two idiotic humans.”

There was a beat before Sam could comprehend what the man in the silvery clothing was implying. “_You’re the star!?_”

The star tilted his head quizzically as if he was surprised that Sam wouldn’t have known that. “Yes.”

“Stars are moody guys in silver pajamas?” Dean barked in surprise. “In what world does that make sense?”

“What else should we be?” asked the star, as he glanced at his tunic briefly, picking at its sleeve.

“Ah, gigantic balls of hydrogen and helium plasma undergoing fusion?” suggested Sam. “Or a space rock that was briefly falling to earth and burning up a bit in the process?”

The star inclined his head, slightly. “I see. You’re thinking of the other sorts of star. As you can clearly see, I am a sentient being, and not a stone or vast quantities of hydrogen compressed by its own mass to a temperature where fusion occurs.”

“But how can a star be a person?” repeated Dean.

At this particular moment, Sam had the epiphany that this was the very thing that they’d come here to find, even if it wasn’t in the form they’d expected. This was the being that Elaine would need to break Dean’s demon contract, and it didn’t look all that cooperative. So… they’d just have to capture it and bring it with them. He began to dig for a pair of handcuffs as Dean distracted it.

“This isn’t the form I would normally have. It would appear that falling here grants me a mortal body. A fragile one at that,” the star said, prodding at his broken leg in clear disgust.

Sam passed Dean the cuffs as he addressed the star. “We need you to come with us.”

He was hoping that the star might be willing to accompany them without coercion. But his initial suspicion that the star would be uncooperative seemed to have been the correct one. “Why would I wish to accompany you anywhere? I am tired and I am hurt and may never get home. I just want to…”

Dean snapped the cuffs around the star’s wrist and his own. “Well, ‘cause we say so for one, and also because of these.” Dean tapped on the handcuffs.

“I’m sorry,” said Sam, beginning to regret what they were doing when the injured star looked at them both in abject horror at their easy capture of him. “It’s just that we need you to help with a spell that’ll save my brother’s life, and we can’t just walk away.”

“And you think that making me your prisoner will make me inclined to help?” the star asked, sounding confused and a little disappointed. “I only wish to return to heaven, and I do not know how I could possibly help you in my current condition. I cannot even heal myself.”

“There’s this good witch,” Dean said slowly, stumbling over the phrase _good witch_ a little. “She said that she needs you for a spell that’ll keep me from going to Hell.”

The star regarded Dean and lurched away as a look of recognition crossed his face. “You are Dean Winchester! And that means that you -” He glanced toward Sam. “-must be Sam Winchester.”

“Um, how do you know our names?” asked Sam.

“My brothers and sisters have observed the two of you for a long time,” the star said. “I can’t help you. _I can’t._ The witch must have lied.”

“What if we could help you?” Dean suddenly asked. “If we could get you back to the sky? Would you help us then?”

“That’s not possible. It is not possible for me to return to the sky now that I have fallen, even if it was not intentional,” the star denied, looking increasingly distressed.

“Not even with a Babylon candle?” Sam broke in, seeing where Dean was going with this.

The star froze and looked at the two of them with wide blue eyes. “You have a Babylon candle?”

Sam produced what was left of it from his pocket. The star observed it and finally announced, “There’s only enough of it left for a single journey.”

“Enough to get you back home, I’d bet,” Dean said with false certainty. “And we’ll let you use it, provided you agree to come with us and help us, and… ah… maybe help us figure out where we are.”

The star seemed torn, but finally said, “I do not know if I can help you, but it seems that I will be coming with you regardless. Do you have a map? Perhaps I can determine from that where I fell.”

“Awesome,” Dean said. “We’ve got a deal.”

* * *

Although it was very late and neither Sam or Dean had slept much, it seemed unwise to stay in the crater after the star had examined the map and pointed at where he thought they were. Elaine had indicated that there would be others hunting for the star, and the crater was too obvious.

Getting the star out of the crater was quite the task. His leg was broken rather badly, and it eventually became clear that Sam would have to climb out of the crater and find a standing pine tree to tie a rope off on to help Dean and the star make the ascent.

Fortunately, Sam didn’t find scaling the crater’s walls particularly difficult, and there were plenty of trees to use as anchors for the rope. He tied it off and dropped it down to his brother and the star, who somehow managed to clamber out even while hindered by handcuffs. Dean cursed a blue streak and the star looked a bit faint by the time they’d gotten out, but all things considered Sam figured it went pretty well.

“You all right?” Dean asked, smacking the star’s shoulder with his free hand.

The star reeled a little. “No. I have a broken leg.”

This seemed like something that would need to be addressed, if they wanted to make any kind of time tonight, Sam thought. “We should probably splint it and make a crutch.”

Dean nodded, “Yeah. I agree. We’re not going to get anywhere, unless we want to carry him.”

The star seemed alarmed at the suggestion of being carried anywhere, and nearly collapsed, his legs buckling. 

Sam made an aborted movement to help, instinct kicking in at the obvious sign of injury, but Dean waved him away, kneeling to help the star sit more comfortably. “It’s cool, Sam. I’ve got him. You go collect some branches for a splint and stuff.”

Sam nodded, even as he frowned, face crunched up. Dean wasn’t usually the one of them that dealt with injured or freaked out civilians, that was typically Sam’s role between the two of them. It wasn’t that Dean was incapable of it, not at all. Just that Dean preferred to leave that to Sam.

Regardless, he needed to go find some sturdy branches, and hopefully a sturdy forked one, too. Fortunately, the devastation of a star falling from the heavens had left plenty of branches and shattered chunks of tree trunks to pick from, and it only took a handful of minutes to find several good candidates for a splint and a large forked branch that would suit nicely as a crutch.

Dean had gotten into their medical supplies while Sam was gone and was instructing the star on how to take some painkillers.

“Found some good ones,” Sam announced holding up the large splinters of wood that more closely resembled a rough two by four than a shattered piece of tree and the branch.

* * *

Splinting the star’s leg was not a pleasant experience, because it was increasingly clear that while the star was very stoic, pain was a very new experience for him. Still, it needed to be done, and both Sam and Dean were experts at do-it-yourself medical care. Sam set the bone as quickly and painlessly as possible, and from there it was just a matter of securing the splint with some of the rope.

The star somehow managed to keep from screaming, although the aborted cry of pain he did let loose with still was distressing to hear.

The difficult part done, the forked branch was sized to the star’s height, and the three of them set off into the forest, hopefully in the direction of the Wall, if the star was correct about their position, if the map was correct, and if Dean had been right in his divining of cardinal directions.

* * *

They walked a few hours that night, until they were sure they’d gone far enough from the crater that anyone else that stumbled across it would not be able to find them easily, but Sam and Dean were both beginning to feel how long their day had been, and soon they were tired enough to begin stumbling over their own feet and every little weed and branch.

They settled in under the largest oak they’d ever seen, and Sam had almost fallen asleep when he heard Dean address the star.

“You gonna sleep, dude?”

“Stars do not require sleep.”

“Well, I do, so stop fidgeting.”

And if there was more to the conversation, Sam didn’t hear it.

* * *

Morning came early when you slept outside, and there was no respite from the sounds of birds chirping and squawking in the thick canopy of leaves, nor was there any hiding from the bright sun.

Sam blinked at the harsh light and wished he could have slept in an actual bed, instead of on the ground, in leaf litter. He brushed as much of the dirt off himself as he could, but knew it was a lost cause.

The star was awake already, or perhaps had truly not slept during the night.

“Dean,” Sam muttered at his brother, trying to wake him. 

Dean woke instantly, scrambling for a weapon and coming up short when his frantic movements tugged on his wrist.

“It’s morning, Dean,” Sam finished, smiling at Dean’s flailing.

“Ugh. We don’t have coffee,” Dean realized, running a hand over his face. “This is gonna suck.”

The star just observed all of this with a calm expression and shockingly vivid blue eyes.

Oddly, it wasn’t the injured star that took the longest to get up and ready to go for the day. It was Dean and his bemoaning the loss of his caffeine that took the longest to get to his feet and gather his gear. Right up until the star jabbed him in the forehead with two fingers of his free hand, and Dean jerked back in surprise.

Sam froze, waiting for his brother to indicate if there was anything wrong, or if the jab had just surprised him. Elaine had suggested that stars were powerful, but it was difficult to say if they were powerful in the way that spell ingredients were, or if they had powers of their own.

“Dude, what was that?” Dean asked, staring into the star’s face like he was the best thing since apple pie. Sam was reassured that whatever had been done, it probably wasn’t harmful.

“I merely adjusted the amount of natural adenosine receptor antagonists in your brain,” the star replied returning Dean’s stare unflinchingly.

“You’re an instant caffeine fix,” Dean muttered. “No more headache. Awesome, dude.”

“My name is not ‘dude’,” the star grumbled, working his way to his feet with the crutch, “My name is Castiel.”

Sam felt chagrined for forgetting to ask what the star’s name was, but he felt the sheer weirdness of yesterday’s events should excuse him for a bit of rudeness.

“Sorry, Castiel,” Sam said, sincerely. “It slipped my mind to even ask. I guess it didn’t occur to me that stars would have names of their own. Or at least, not ones that humans could pronounce.”

“Yeah, what my brother said,” Dean agreed, pulling a little on the handcuff as he started off in the generally north-eastern direction that they thought the Wall lay in.

* * *

They walked in silence. Castiel’s injury made the going slow, as did the wilderness they found themselves in. It was beautiful, like a national park, but it had no paths, and brush and tall grass was difficult to navigate with a broken leg and a crutch.

Sam was surprised to find that Dean seemed to be more amused by their predicament than annoyed with it. He’d been surprised that Dean had offered the candle in exchange for Castiel’s cooperation, although he supposed that they couldn’t very well use it if Castiel didn’t want to cooperate anyway. If Castiel wanted to, he could just think of somewhere other than where they wanted to go, and they might end up anywhere, and neither Castiel or the Winchesters would be any further ahead in their goals. But it still meant they had what looked to be weeks’ worth of ground to cover on foot, much of it wilderness. It seemed unlikely that Dean would be happy about that.

Nonetheless, Dean seemed fairly content strolling through the picturesque pine forest, helping a star with a broken leg over fallen logs or through particularly prickly undergrowth. Perhaps he was just happy to be away from the blood and the gore of their normal life.

By midday, Castiel broke the silence. “Sam. Dean. Stop.”

Sam turned around, to where the star was leaning a little on his brother, looking worn and pained on his crutch. Castiel had gone a bit gray and was shaking. “I do not understand, but I cannot keep moving. My limbs are too heavy and so are my eyelids. I cannot keep my eyes open. Something is wrong.”

“You’re tired,” Sam diagnosed. “I thought stars didn’t need to sleep.”

“We do not,” Castiel sounded affronted by the suggestion, but sagged to the ground. “But perhaps that changes when we have a body such as this.” The admission seemed to grate on him.

Dean shrugged. “We could probably use a break. Get something to eat.” With that, Dean plopped himself on the ground and began rummaging through his bag with his free hand.

He must have found this inconvenient because he shook his head, and glanced over at Castiel, who was propping himself up against a nearby tree trunk, dragging Dean’s wrist along with him.

“All right. Sam, I think we can probably get rid of the cuffs for right now. Pretty sure he isn’t going anywhere fast,” Dean announced, holding out his hand for the keys.

Sam felt a slight sense of unease about releasing a supernatural creature with unknown powers, but he had to admit that Dean was probably right. Castiel was injured and probably couldn’t outrun them even if he wasn’t so exhausted that he could barely keep his eyes open.

He produced the keys, and Dean was soon happily rubbing his wrist and enthusiastically chowing down on the cheese and crackers in his MRE.

Sam figured he may as well join in, and soon was halfway through a MRE himself, glad to be taking a rest and getting the duffel bag’s weight off his shoulders.

Castiel was deeply asleep, but they agreed that they had better let him rest for a while. They’d wake him in an hour, and let him have something to eat, if he needed it. _Did stars need food? Or was that something that Castiel would only realize he needed after his stomach protested enough?_ Sam didn’t know the answer to his questions, but Elaine had given them enough food to last a good while.

“Why are you in such a good mood?” Sam finally asked Dean, after they were both finished eating and were lazily resting while they waited a little longer for Castiel to nap.

Dean startled slightly. “Huh?”

“I figured you’d be annoyed about not getting back to the car, and hunting, and having to walk, and sleeping outdoors,” Sam pointed out. “But you seem pretty content, at least after Castiel fixed your caffeine headache.”

Dean shrugged. “I dunno. This whole thing, it seems almost like a vacation. No demons. No monsters. Just an injured dude who is also a fallen star. It’s like something out of a stupid fantasy novel. Like a quest? It’s a lot less like a horror movie than our normal stuff, anyway?”

“This is about your deal, Dean,” Sam reminded him, but smiled at the thought of this being an adventure out of _Lord of the Rings_ rather than a slasher film.

“Yeah, yeah. I know. It’s just a nice change of pace. Nothing trying to kill us. Us not having to kill anything. And it turns out stars can just…” He mimicked the finger-tap to his forehead. “Instant cup of joe. So I don’t even have to suffer through caffeine withdrawal.”

“The scenery is pretty great, too,” Sam agreed, thinking about the hilltop they’d walked along earlier in the day. The view of the valley below, and the mountains in the distance had been striking.

“Definitely better than digging up bones in a cemetery at three in the morning,” Dean nodded.

When they finally woke Castiel a few minutes later, they offered him a MRE, but as Sam half predicted, Castiel claimed that stars did not require human sustenance. However, his stomach grumbling loudly belied his pronouncement, and Dean ended up cajoling him into trying some food.

* * *

The next couple of days passed in an entirely unremarkable manner. They walked as far as they could, stopping a few times for food and water, and to rest their legs before finally stopping for the night to sleep under the open sky. Thankfully, it was warm even at night in Faerie, and what little chill did come, the coats they’d worn to keep out the cold of Michigan in March were more than sufficient to handle. Castiel, for his part, seemed unaffected by the chill, although Dean offered one of his jackets anyway.

The weather was good and the wilderness surprisingly forgiving for how long they’d gone without any sign of human life (or whatever passed for people in Faerie), and they were making good time considering Castiel’s broken leg.

But by the fourth day, Sam was feeling the grime on his skin and was longing for a shower and a real bed. Dean was getting increasingly irritable, likely for the same reason. Castiel just looked miserable, but it was difficult to say if it was because he was as grimy as the other two, or if it was just from the pain in his leg. Sam didn’t think he looked as gross as he imagined himself to look and he could see that Dean did.

“All right!” Dean snapped. “We need to find a road, and a hotel or something. I feel like my skin is going to crawl off my bones if I don’t get this dirt off me.”

Sam wasn’t about to disagree with Dean on that point. His scalp felt like ants were crawling all over, and he couldn’t confidently dismiss it as only in his head. So he produced the map, and soon he and his brother were arguing about where they were.

After several minutes and a number of exchanged insults, Sam continued to be certain that the nearest road was a couple of miles to the south, and Dean maintained that they weren’t _there_ but clearly over _here_ and so the nearest road would have to be to the west _obviously_.

Castiel had lowered himself to the ground next to a big ash tree, and watched the brothers fight over their location with amusement. He’d been singularly unhelpful, except in his pitying finger-tap in the morning to Dean’s head, and generally only piped up to complain about how utterly useless human bodies were. However, he’d at least not been actively hostile, so Sam figured that was about the best they could hope for, having almost but not quite kidnapped the star.

“Okay, okay!” Sam finally shouted. “We should split up. If either one of us is right, we’re only a few miles from the road, and we can make that hike in an hour or two. We can leave Castiel here, look for the road, and meet back here in a couple hours. Hopefully, one of us will be right.”

“You want to leave Castiel here, alone?” Dean asked. “You don’t think that’ll be a problem?”

Sam shrugged, “Hey, Castiel?”

“What?” the star grumbled, having nearly fallen asleep while they were arguing about roads and maps.

“If we go look for the road, will you stay put here?” Sam asked.

Castiel only stared at him, gesturing to his leg. “It seems unlikely that I would have any other option.”

Dean nodded, “Well, stay here anyway.”

“I’ll go south and you’ll go west?” Sam confirmed.

“Yep.”

“See you in a few hours, jerk.”

“Bitch.”


	6. The Unicorn and the Tree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Dean separate to look for an inn, leaving Castiel alone when an unlikely ally finds him.

There was no road to the south. This Sam was quite certain of, and he was more than a little annoyed by it. Dean would certainly rub it in his face for a good long time if he had been right and a road was to be found to the west. And Sam was not in the right frame of mind for that kind of annoyance.

Regardless, it was well past time for him to turn around and head back to the ash tree that they’d left Castiel to sleep under.

“If there’s any justice in the world,” Sam muttered under his breath, as he turned around and began walking back the way he’d come. “Dean won’t have found anything either.”

* * *

There was no road to the west, and Dean couldn’t have been any more pissed about that. He was torn between hoping that Sam had had better luck, and there was a warm bed, clean clothes and a shower in his near future, although not necessarily in that order, and hoping that Sam had struck out too, so he wouldn’t have to deal with his brother’s smug smirk.

Either way, he’d been hiking back toward the ash tree for a while now and would likely be there soon. He hoped that Castiel was all right. They hadn’t encountered any wild animals yet, but there had been signs of coyotes and wolves, and Dean was certain he’d spotted marks on tree trunks from bear claws. It would be just their luck to have his one shot at avoiding Hell get munched on by a run-of-the-mill animal because Sam and Dean couldn’t take one more day of being covered in their own grime.

Besides, for all that Castiel was about as warm and cuddly as a porcupine, Dean had to respect his ability to keep up with them when he had a broken leg, all while being new to having a corporal body and experiencing pain. Castiel was one tough son of a bitch for a star in pajamas. Dean didn’t want to see him get killed by a wolf.

* * *

The Winchester brothers had departed, leaving Castiel alone. Castiel had expected to be relieved to be away from the humans who had been asking the impossible of him. He did not know what the witch they’d mentioned had been thinking when she’d promised that she could break a demon contract if she had a star. If she truly understood what stars were, she would never have suggested it. It wasn’t that what she’d told them was impossible, but not with Castiel having fallen, and only if his superiors had ordered such a thing done. Castiel had no such orders, and he knew what the Winchesters were destined for. Dean’s damnation, however regrettable, was foretold. Castiel could not interfere. Especially if he were to hold out any hope that his siblings would allow him to return.

At that thought, he looked to the Heavens, where his brothers and sisters remained, and prayed that one of them might help him. He had not torn his grace out, and he had not fallen by the will of God. It was some Faerie magic that had forced his fall into this strange body that was not a vessel. Of course, there would be no answer, not when he was in Faerie, not when he was interfering with the Winchesters, however unwillingly.

He settled back against the tree and let out a frustrated breath. There was nothing to do but wait for the brothers to return. Until then he would try to rest and try to will this body to heal. It had been fruitless so far but perhaps persistence would be the answer.

It was some time before he heard the first rustles in the undergrowth of something approaching.

“Dean?” Castiel queried, but there was no response.

“Sam?” he tried again, but still there was no answer.

Castiel began to struggle to get on his feet, in case a predatory animal had discovered him, injured and alone. He did not know if he could summon forth his blade, even, and had never been so aware of his own vulnerability before. Whatever it was, it was large and drawing close quickly. Castiel’s heart beat ever faster in fear of the unknown creature. He held his crutch out in front of him, in hopes that he might be able to use it as a club if all else failed him.

The creature breached the undergrowth and Castiel let out a sigh of relief. The source of the noise had only been a unicorn, its white coat shining in the last of the evening sun.

“Hello, moon’s child,” Castiel greeted it politely. Unicorns were creatures of powerful white magic and strongly associated with the moon, and he hoped that it would respond to a gentle tone and kind words.

The unicorn approached him fearlessly and bowed its head, permitting Castiel to stroke its muzzle.

“I am glad to see you, unicorn,” Castiel murmured. “Why have you come?”

The unicorn nudged Castiel with its nose and then lowered itself to the ground in front of the star, clearly telegraphing to Castiel that the creature meant for him to ride.

“I am honored,” Castiel told the unicorn and maneuvered himself around to the unicorn’s side. It was a struggle to swing his splinted leg over its back. After a few awkward movements, Castiel was comfortably astride with his makeshift crutch tucked under his arm. The unicorn seemed to understand when Castiel was settled, and carefully got to its feet, so that it did not jostle its rider.

Castiel smiled. Perhaps with the unicorn’s help, he would find a way to contact his siblings and one of them might be prevailed upon to help him return to Heaven, before his presence and the meddling witch managed to throw into chaos the divine plan. The unicorn began a slow smooth walk away from the ash tree, headed toward the east.

* * *

Having nothing better to do, Dean had spent some of the walk back collecting sticks for a fire. Perhaps a fire would improve their moods, even if they couldn’t get a shower. Or a bath. At this rate, Dean would even appreciate a good rain, even if he did end up smelling like wet dog afterward.

He reached the ash tree where they’d left Castiel but although the tree looked right and Dean’s bag was still tucked under a large root, Castiel was nowhere to be found.

“Castiel?” Dean called out. “Castiel!” There was no reply and there was no sign of the star. At the very least, Dean could take comfort in that the star appeared to have left freely and under his own power. There were no signs of a struggle or blood. There also weren’t any tracks. The ground was far too dry for that and the ever present leaf litter further obscured any footprints. Besides, although Dean was a very good Hunter, he had never bothered with hunting deer or anything like that, and he certainly wasn’t the sort that could look at a bent blade of grass and tell you what sort of animals had walked past in the previous two weeks.

Furious, Dean yelled again: “God dammit! Castiel! Sam! Sam! You around?”

If Castiel was within earshot, he did not answer. Sam didn’t answer him either, but Dean supposed that there was a little time yet before they had agreed to meet back here anyway, and it was likely that Sam was still a good distance off but on his way back. Dean charging off away from the designated meeting place would only make it more difficult to find one another.

Dean threw the sticks he’d collected to the ground, hearing them clatter against one another and scatter, but not able to bring himself to care. They’d lost Castiel, and with him Dean’s best and possibly only chance to avoid damnation. He sat down and leaned against the ash, pressing his hands to his face.

* * *

Sam considered himself lucky that he’d stubbornly decided to walk a little longer before giving up and returning to the rendezvous point back at the ancient ash tree. It was clear that the structure he’d discovered had once been a barn, but it looked like it had been abandoned for many years. He’d circled it for a while in hopes of finding evidence of a trail or road leading to and from it, but he’d had no luck on that front.

The barn still appeared to be structurally sound, though, even if Sam wouldn’t have wanted to climb into the upper portions, as it looked to be suffering from significant dry rot.

Still, with the thunder Sam was hearing off in the distance, it seemed imprudent not to check it out and perhaps he could convince Dean to consider taking shelter there for the night. He didn’t think it would be a hard sell. A roof and four walls were preferable to none, even if that roof was likely a bit leaky and the walls were definitely drafty.

* * *

Dean hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but after several minutes of futilely cursing the sky and snapping a twig into tiny pieces, Dean felt so worn out that he found himself dozing off against the big ash.

His dreams were strange, and he woke with a start when a rather large stick struck his head. He was instantly on his feet with his pistol drawn. There was nothing in the little clearing, though. No indication of what had thrown the stick.

_‘Good, you’re awake,’_ something said, in a voice like leaves rustling.

“Who the hell said that?” Dean shouted, looking around and seeing nothing.

_‘**I** did,’_ the voice replied, sounding like the cry of the wind. _‘The tree you’ve been sleeping against for the last half hour.’_

“The… what?” Dean snapped the pistol up and pointed it at the tree trunk. After a moment, he thought better of it. Some gasoline and a lighter were a better defense against evil trees. He knew this from that time with the evil orchard.

_‘You need to listen to me,’_ the tree continued, with a voice like the creaking of a floor board. _‘A unicorn came to help Castiel, but it is leading him into danger. A trap.’_

“How would you know? You’re just a magical talking tree!” Dean hadn’t felt this confused since the first time he’d had a run-in with the Trickster.

Somehow the tree managed to sound smug, _‘A little god told me.’_

“A little god,” repeated Dean, flatly.

_‘Yes,’_ the tree replied, _‘But that’s neither here nor there. Castiel is in danger. No star is safe in Stormhold, because the witches here wish to devour their hearts for power and youth. That was the fate of the last star to fall several centuries ago, and it will be the fate of Castiel, if you do not act quickly. There is a coach approaching on the road to the east of here, and by any means necessary, you **must** catch it.’_

Dean tucked his gun away and began to run. Castiel was perhaps his only hope of avoiding Hell, but even if he wasn’t, he didn’t deserve to have his heart hacked from his chest and ate by witches.

* * *

“Dean? Castiel?” Sam called out when he arrived back at the old ash tree. It was well past sunset but the full moon illuminated everything in a colorless glow, so Sam was surprised that he could not see anyone. He tried calling again: “Dean!”

There was no answer from Dean, and Sam couldn’t see Castiel anywhere. There was no sign of a struggle, no scuffles in the dirt, no blood, no corpses. So that was a good sign, and Sam knew it. Whatever had happened, or not happened, it likely had not been violent.

Still, Sam couldn’t quite shake the slight panic that something bad had happened to Dean. It might have been irrational, but ever since the time loop at that Mystery Spot that anxiety simply couldn’t quite be alleviated, at least not until Sam could confirm with his own eyes that Dean was fine. Which he couldn’t, because Dean wasn’t here and wasn’t within earshot.

“He’s probably fine,” muttered Sam to himself. “He’s probably just fine.” Saying it didn’t help, and Sam found himself searching his things for a flashlight. There had to be some indication of where Castiel and Dean had gone. A note. Or tracks. Something.

_Yes! There!_

There were hoof-prints in the soil, heading off in a direction that neither he nor Dean had gone to explore. Sam didn’t think that it was odd that hoof-prints were visible in such dry soil, perhaps because he’d never really been taught woodscraft despite all those years of learning to hunt monsters.

He checked his weapons and began following the tracks as quickly as he could without losing sight of them.

* * *

Dean may not have been sure why he was listening to a _tree_ of all things, but he took off at a sprint in the direction the tree had indicated. The footpath he found himself taking through the forest was surprisingly clear of tree roots and branches. In fact, Dean was reasonably sure that there hadn’t been a footpath here at all until he had started down it. He got the feeling that the forest itself was trying to clear his way and guide him. Any other day, he’d have found that beyond strange but he’d woken up to have a _tree_ tell him that a _star_ was in danger because a _unicorn_ was stupid enough to lead the aforementioned star into a trap designed by _witches that wanted to eat stars’ hearts_. Some days, Dean thought, you just had to roll with the weird. And apparently sprint toward a road and a carriage that may or may not exist.

The undergrowth began to clear even further and Dean saw the glow of lanterns moving through the tree-line and the sound of hooves thudding against the ground.

There was a carriage!

Dean wasn’t sure he’d manage to catch it. It was already nearly past him and moving fast, but he found it in himself to put on one last burst of speed.

He collided with the side of the carriage and found himself spinning onto the road, slightly stunned. Distantly he figured that he was lucky that he hadn’t gotten caught under the big wooden wheel that had gone by his head.

“Whoa!” someone called from the carriage.

The carriage slowed and came to a halt as Dean struggled to sit upright.

Before Dean could do much more than push himself into a semi-upright position a blonde man with a sword of some kind was standing over him and pressing the aforementioned blade to his chest.

Dean hadn’t even had time to reach for his gun. Deciding that the man would likely run him through if he so much as reached for his weapon, he held his hands up in a non-threatening manner as he tried to catch his breath.

“If Septimus insists on sending a vagrant to do an assassin’s job…” the man grumbled, pressing the blade a little harder into Dean’s chest.

“Hold on a minute, dude!” Dean protested. “I don’t know anybody by the name of Septimus. I just was trying to catch a ride!”

The man looked skeptical and more than a little haggard, like he’d not been getting enough sleep, despite having what looked like expensive clothing to go with his fancy carriage and four matching black horses. Dean gambled that a Faerie dude wouldn’t know a gun was a weapon, even if he could see it, and so he said, “I’m not an assassin. I don’t even have a sword! Or a bow and arrows. I’m not trying to kill you, or whatever. So will you do me a big favor and let me ride with you?”

The man considered this for a moment before coming to a decision. He must have been satisfied that Dean wasn’t armed, for he put his blade away, but sternly replied, “I’m afraid that’s impossible.” He turned away and began to walk back to his carriage. “I’m on a quest of enormous importance, and I cannot offer aid to hitchhikers.”

Dean pushed himself to his feet and began to follow the man as quickly as he could. “That so? I bet you could use a lookout, or an extra set of hands? I could help you with that.”

The man did not acknowledge him and climbed into the driver’s seat of the carriage, gathering the horses’ reins as he did so.

“Look! Dude! If you’re on some big quest, wouldn’t you have better luck with an ally?” Dean asked. “Come on! Doesn’t look like you’ve been able to get any sleep in days, let’s help one another out.”

The man considered this. “Very well. Get on.” He moved aside to give Dean some room to sit beside him on the driver’s seat.

“Awesome,” Dean said, smiling, as he climbed aboard and nearly swore as he realized he’d left behind all of his supplies at the tree in his haste to chase this carriage down. All he now had on him was his gun and his favorite knife, and the pouch of money that Elaine had given him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At last we begin to encounter a familiar cast of characters that those of you who have seen Stardust will certainly recognize.
> 
> For the most part, these characters are doing exactly what you'd expect them to be doing off screen. With a few deviations here and there.
> 
> It's also worth noting that I do, from time to time, reproduce the dialogue from the film, especially where changing it didn't make a great deal of sense.


	7. The Inn of the Chariot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Castiel and the unicorn find an inn but not everything is as it seems.

It had begun to storm as the unicorn smoothly paced along the road it had found for Castiel. He hunched over feeling even more miserable than normal, as the cold sheets of rain soaked his silvery clothing and his skin. It was cold, so much colder than he’d ever expected it to be.

There was a building up ahead, and as the unicorn neared it, Castiel saw the sign that announced it to be an inn. This was what Sam and Dean had been searching for, although they’d both gone in the wrong direction to find it. From listening to their argument, however, Castiel knew that within such a building he could find shelter and warmth and food.

He pulled lightly on the unicorn’s mane to indicate that he wished to go to the inn, and the unicorn indulged him, turning aside from the road and up the dirt path to the inn’s front door.

It took Castiel a little while to dismount, as chilled as he was and with his broken leg being uncoordinated and his crutch being unwieldy. Still, he managed after a while and he thanked the unicorn for its patience with him.

The unicorn snorted in reply.

Castiel limped to the front door and tried to peer through the warped glass that formed a small window at the top of the door. He knocked on it gently and a woman quickly came to let him in.

“Goodness me, my dear,” the woman said, sounding oddly distressed with Castiel’s soaked appearance. “Come in out of the rain!” She stepped out into the rain to gently touch his arm and usher him inside. “We have food and drink and a warm bed and plenty of hot water for a bath. I am Lamia, and I am the proprietor of this inn, along with my husband, Billy.”

That all sounded nice to Castiel, even if he didn’t know that he enjoyed food and drink. (He required food and drink, as he’d discovered, but he wasn’t terribly fond of those “MREs” that Dean had convinced him to try). Nonetheless the warmth and dry was appealing, and maybe a bath would be nice, too.

Once he’d shuffled inside on his crutch, Lamia closed the door behind him. He stumbled into the middle of the room, and immediately Lamia began bustling about, fetching a large caldron full of water and placing it over a roaring fire. Castiel watched this closely, not entirely certain he recalled the purpose of this action. Sometimes these sorts of metal vessels were used to prepare food, if he remembered correctly.

“How do you like your bath?” Lamia addressed him. “Warm, hot, or boil-a-lobster?”

“I do not know,” Castiel answered honestly after a moment’s pause.

“Then do let me choose for you,” Lamia said, approaching him and smoothing the wet hair from his forehead, “and I’ll have my husband take your horse to the stable.”

Castiel wasn’t sure that he wanted Lamia to be touching him at all, even if she’d been nothing but kind and accommodating so far. But he stood his ground and didn’t flinch from her. “It is a unicorn, not a horse,” Castiel stated, “and would be offended to be referred to as such.”

“Of course, of course! How silly of me,” Lamia laughed, and then she called for her husband.

Billy was the strange man who had been behind the bar, chewing on a towel. He spit the towel from his mouth at her shout and hopped over the counter to walk, stiff-legged and awkwardly outside to tend to Castiel’s unicorn companion.

With this being taken care of, Lamia turned back to Castiel and gave him a smile, “Now, let’s get you out of your wet things, shall we? I’ll fill the tub.”

* * *

A little while later, Castiel was ushered to a large copper tub filled with water of an absolutely perfect temperature near the crackling fire within the huge fireplace. He didn’t feel any particular discomfort in being unclothed in front of Lamia or her daughter, as being discomforted by nudity was a human trait he’d never seen much point in. Besides, Lamia didn’t seem upset by it either as she stayed nearby to ensure that the water remained at the proper temperature, twirling her finger in the surface of the water.

“Feeling better?” she asked him.

“I am feeling better. Thank you,” Castiel replied. “Warm water is surprisingly pleasant after being out in the cold rain and in the wilderness.”

“And how is your leg? Any improvement?” Lamia asked.

Castiel was surprised to find that it had ceased hurting. He moved it in a manner that would have hurt badly not long ago and found that it caused him no discomfort. “That is quite extraordinary. Do you have a gift of healing?” For although Castiel had not sensed any magic, he supposed that he might have been distracted by the pleasantness of being warm and missed some subtle healing magic in the water. Even if that was not the case, Castiel had noticed that the senses he was used to seemed to be dimmed in this body and in this place. He had not sensed the unicorn as a magical entity as it had approached him. Perhaps his ability to sense magic in all its forms was impaired.

“I have been told that I have some small gifts for healing,” Lamia demurred humbly. “It was the least I could do for a guest. I’m just glad that you’re feeling better. You seem a little happier, too.”

Castiel smiled as he leaned back to enjoy a little more of the warm water, closing his eyes and reveling in the sensation. This aspect of having a body of his own he could come to enjoy. It was ever so pleasant, to soak in a bathtub filled with warm water.

“I believe that I am,” Castiel acknowledged, even though he was somewhat unfamiliar with what happiness was, at least as humans experienced it. Emotions were a foreign thing in the heavens.

“Wonderful! There’s nothing like a nice long soak to warm the cockles of your heart,” Lamia commented.

This seemed to signal the end of the bath, as the daughter appeared with a towel and a bathrobe.

* * *

After Castiel had dried himself off and pulled on the bathrobe, Lamia ushered Castiel upstairs to his room. The room was spacious, and the bed was large and looked to be quite comfortable, and he felt a tiny bit more happiness at the thought of trying to sleep here. For this body of his demanded that he must eventually rest, and he felt nearly relaxed enough that he thought he might finally manage to doze off at night.

Lamia had kept up a pleasant chatter as she’d led him here, and now was saying, “Now, I’m only a simple innkeeper’s wife, but I’m told, as I’ve said, that I have a healer’s hands.” She pulled back the bedspread and blankets of the bed, folding them neatly at the end of the bed. “I’d be glad to give you a massage.”

“A massage?” Castiel questioned, not immediately recalling what object or custom Lamia might be referring to.

“Never had…” Lamia began in surprise, “well, bless my soul. Nothing like a massage to send you off for the finest and deepest night’s sleep.”

“I do have trouble sleeping at night,” Castiel pondered.

“Lie on your back, dear,” Lamia instructed him.

Castiel arranged himself comfortably on the bed, staring up at this pleasant woman.

“Why not close your eyes?” she asked him, gently. “You’ll drift off better that way.”

He did as she asked.

She tugged slightly on the bathrobe, pulling it open a little at his chest. He recalled now that a massage was a thing that humans did to other humans where they rubbed their hands on another human’s skin to make the second human feel better, so he didn’t question this. He heard her kneel down and reach for something that skittered slightly against the floor.

However, before she could begin, there was a loud pounding on the front door of the inn below them, and an even louder shout of “**HELLO!**”.

* * *

The man that the carriage belonged to was called Primus, Dean had discovered as they had driven through the night. It had begun to pour down rain a little while ago, but that hadn’t stopped Primus from talking. Dean had learned that Primus was the firstborn son of the king of Stormhold, who had recently died. Customarily, the sons of the king would kill each other until there was only a single remaining heir, but in this instance four of the sons had lived long enough to see their father die of old age. Two of the remaining brothers had been killed by Septimus, the youngest and cruelest of the brothers, shortly after their father’s death, and this was the man that Primus had thought Dean might have been employed by. So now only Primus and Septimus were in competition for the crown, and they had been tasked with retrieving a stone of some importance which Primus was tracking through the use of some runes carved into the knucklebones of some kind of dead monster. The son that retrieved the stone would become king, and so Primus was racing to find it first while avoiding his murderous brother’s attempts on his life.

Dean, however, was distracted. The storm made him worry for Sam’s wellbeing, as well as for how Castiel was doing. The tree had warned him that Castiel was in danger from witches, and Dean knew all too well the horrible, disgusting things that witches liked to get up to. He’d cleaned up the messes they’d left behind after he’d killed them too many times not to know that. And Sam! Sam would be freaking out when he came back to the ash tree and couldn’t find anyone. He hoped that the tree might tell Sam where to go to find him, or at least the road.

Still, it was going to be a long and miserable night if he and Primus didn’t find some shelter soon. Besides, Dean didn’t want to hear any more about fratricide.

Luckily, no sooner had Dean thought this than the lights of an inn could be seen in the distance, and Primus pressed the horses for a little more speed in his haste to get out of the poor weather.

When they arrived, Primus put Dean in charge of holding the two lead horses steady while he went to pay for rooms and the care of the horses. Dean hadn’t been around horses much but these ones with their glossy black coats and remarkable stamina reminded him of his beloved car. (He hoped that Elaine was taking good care of it and not doing anything witchy to it, while he and Sam were here in Faerie.)

He held the reins and patted the two lead animals as they fidgeted in the cold rain. Their skin was hot under his hands and their breath steamed visibly into the air.

“Service!” Primus shouted at the door.

“Maybe we should try the next inn?” Dean called, thinking that he’d rather be moving than waiting here all night for no one to answer the door. “Especially if this stone you’re looking for is as close as your runes say.”

Dean still wasn’t overly fond of the slightly witchy undertones of using knucklebones to divine the location of an object, but it was a less objectional form of locating magic than most he’d been acquainted with in the past. It required less blood and fire than he was used to, at any rate. And those runes had claimed that the stone that Primus sought was just up ahead and very nearby.

Primus didn’t seem ready to give up on a guarantee of a dry and warm place to sleep, and Dean couldn’t entirely blame him for that. He still very much wanted to wash the grime off himself, which he now felt sliding down his body in muddy rivets.

“I’ll give it one more try,” Primus announced.

* * *

Castiel listened to the pounding and shouting at the door, watching Lamia curiously.

She seemed to realize that Castiel was observing her, and so smiled tightly at him before she said softly, “Relax. I’ll be back just as soon as I’ve taken care of this customer.”

* * *

“At last!” Primus announced as a man finally opened the door to the inn. “We require accommodation. Please help my friend take the horses to the stables.”

The man made a sound that might have been mistaken for a grumble, and stepped out into the rain to tend to the horses. Primus slipped inside of the inn and left Dean and the man to their work.

The man was odd as he led Dean and the horses under an overhang that appeared to be where the carriage could be stored overnight. The man’s movements were awkward and stiff, and he went about his work slowly and without speaking. Dean supposed that he might be mute? Still, soon enough the horses had been freed from their harnesses and moved into a stable, where the two of them could work on removing the rest of the tack and drying the horses off.

* * *

All of the noise from the first floor had interrupted Castiel’s blissful state of relaxation, and his curiosity was quickly getting the better of him. He wandered down the stairs and was greeted by a man he did not recognize luxuriating in his abandoned bathwater.

The man seemed to have been expecting Castiel’s appearance, too, for he quickly began speaking to him, “I’m accustomed to better service, but you’re awake now and that’s what counts. Prepare your best room.” Castiel couldn’t quite imagine what the man could be talking about, but as he was the only person in sight, he also couldn’t imagine that the man could be addressing anyone else.

“I’ll thank you not to bother my guest, sir,” Lamia admonished the man, as she approached with a goblet of wine on a platter for him. “I am the proprietor of this inn.” She offered him the goblet. “Glass of wine?”

“No,” the man replied, regretfully. “Until my brother is dead, I have vowed to drink only my own wine. Though my friend in the stables might be glad of a drop. Your best room perhaps?”

Lamia seemed disappointed at the man’s refusal of the wine, but she recovered quickly to smile and say, “Of course.”

She handed the platter and the goblet to her daughter with a quick instruction to take it to the man’s companion in the stables before she strode away.

“I’m sorry,” the man addressed Castiel once more. “I presumed that you were in charge. Are you travelling alone?”

Without waiting for Castiel’s reply, he continued. “I’ve just stabled my four black stallions and my carriage. Well, I say mine. It belonged to my late father.”

And so, the man droned on and on. Castiel wasn’t sure if he ought to excuse himself or if it was politer to just let the man continue to talk. The man seemed happy in having an audience, and it was not a great hardship to pretend to be interested in his stories. After all, the man had just lost his father.

* * *

Dean couldn’t help but find the process of taking care of the horses to be relaxing. It wasn’t altogether dissimilar from tending to his beloved car. Except these were living, breathing creatures and seemed to express their happiness when he removed the sticky leather tack from their rain-and-sweat soaked skin and began drying them off with towels that the strange man had provided. After the horses were mostly dry, Dean grabbed one of the brushes that looked like the one that the man was using and helped to groom each of the animals. This, in particular, seemed to make the horses happy, if the pleasant soft snorting noises they made as their heads began to droop were any indication.

He’d just gotten the last of the horses tucked into their warm stall, when a young woman entered the stable carrying a platter with a goblet on it. The man had left a little while ago, when it appeared that Dean had the last of the task of putting the horses in the stall well at hand.

The woman silently offered the goblet to him, and Dean couldn’t help but give her a flirtatious smile. “Thanks. Nice of you to brave the rain to bring a guy something to drink after a long night. I’m Dean, what’s your name?”

“Bernard,” was the reply, in a baritone voice better suited to a man than the red-headed woman Dean was looking at.

Dean was shocked enough that he didn’t take a swig of wine as he’d intended to, and just stood there, puzzled. Had he heard that? Or was his mind finally starting to play tricks on him after all that time out in the wilderness and maybe hitting his head when he got knocked down after the panicked run to catch the carriage?

* * *

Castiel still hadn’t managed to get in even a single word edgewise, and the man was still talking about his late father’s unmatched skill as a horseman and how this related to the stallions and the carriage. And something about once riding a camel.

“That’s all very nice,” Castiel finally found a break in the man’s stories and attempted to excuse himself. “If you’ll excuse me…”

“Wait!” the man called out. “That stone you’re wearing. It can’t be.”

Castiel looked down at the instrument of his fall, where it hung around his neck on a golden chain, not quite understanding the man’s sudden fascination with it.

“Come here,” the man cajoled. “Let me see it.”

* * *

Having shaken off the worst of the confusion about the woman who might be named Bernard and have a voice like a man, Dean finally went to take that drink. Yet before he could do so, a disturbance in the large and sturdy stall at the far end of the stable brought him up short. The animal within was clearly distressed and freaking out, whinnying and lashing out at the door of the stall, which explosively gave way under the animal’s assault on it.

Of all the improbable things, a unicorn leapt free of the stall and charged at him. Dean tried to get out of its way, but the unicorn’s shoulder caught him in the side and sent him sprawling onto the hay-covered floor. The wine flew from his hand and landed in the straw nearby, but Dean payed it no mind. He was busy covering his head in fear that the unicorn might make another attempt at running him down and trampling him.

When nothing happened for a few moments, Dean cautiously looked up at the unicorn. It was calmly standing over him and pointed its forehoof at the spilled wine.

Confused, Dean looked down at the goblet. Where the wine had touched the straw, smoke was rising.

“It was poisoned,” Dean muttered to himself. “Shit! Primus!”

* * *

Unsure of what to make of the request and loathe to relinquish what was both a very powerful object and what little proof he had that he hadn’t meant to fall, Castiel did not approach the man in the bath. This seemed to anger him, for he snarled, “You have no idea what you’re meddling with. I am Primus, the first born of Stormhold and I demand that you bring it to me! Bring me the stone! Now!”

Castiel took an uneasy step away from Primus and attempted to summon his blade. It did not manifest, which only spooked Castiel even worse.

Just at that moment, the door to the inn burst open and a familiar voice shouted: “Primus! Don’t touch anything they give you! They tried to poi…!”

Before Dean could finish delivering his warning, Lamia had snuck up behind the prince with a large obsidian knife and slit his throat with brutal efficiency. Blue blood spurted from the wound as the prince collapsed into the tub.

* * *

Dean had caught sight of Castiel the moment he’d set foot within the inn. Castiel was now wearing a terrycloth bathrobe, which was surprising. Dean wasn’t sure why Castiel had ditched the silver pajamas. Or how he was standing without the aid of his crutch.

Still, despite his effort to aid Primus, the prince was dead, so Dean’s priorities now switched to protecting himself and the star from this murderous woman with her huge and terrifying stone knife.

He hurried to Castiel and gave him a quick look over, checking for visible injuries. “Are you alright?”

Castiel nodded, quickly, looking a little shocked at this bizarre turn of events.

The woman called for someone: “Billy!” 

The strange man that had helped Dean with the horses hopped up from behind the bar. “Get him!” she ordered the man as she pointed at Dean.

Dean pushed Castiel behind him and reached for the gun he’d tucked into his jeans. But before he could do more than grip the handle of it, the unicorn charged through the open door and toward the man. It was over quickly, as they headbutted one another, and the man flew back, dead, but now in the shape of a small, white billy goat.

The unicorn reared and feinted with its horn at the woman, who backed away from it. Dean briefly thought that perhaps, of all strange things, that he and Castiel were about to be rescued by a unicorn. Sam would never let him live it down when he heard about it.

Then the woman extended a hand toward the unicorn and green flames shot from her outstretched fingertips. The unicorn had no chance to flee or dodge before it was entirely engulfed in fire. It gave one distressed whinny before the unnatural flames consumed it entirely and it crumpled to the ground.

Realizing they were dealing with a witch, Dean and Castiel made a break for the door, but that too was quickly engulfed in flames as the witch extended a finger toward the door, and then toward the window Dean rapidly changed course and headed for.

All too quickly all possible exits were engulfed in unnatural green flame and Dean and Castiel were trapped within the inn with a murderous witch. Dean pulled his gun and leveled it at her, but nothing happened when he pulled the trigger. Although Dean normally kept his gun in pristine condition, the mechanism seemed to have jammed. Given the amount of rain and getting tossed around it had endured in the last handful of hours, Dean probably shouldn’t have been surprised. “Son of a bitch!”

The only thing to do was to back away from the slowly approaching witch and hope for a miracle, as Dean tried desperately to think if he had any other weapon on him that would be useful against a witch. He had his bowie knife, but he didn’t like his chances against the witch’s obsidian one.

“The burning golden heart of a star at peace is so much better than your frightened little heart,” the witch observed, obsidian blade outstretched. “Even so, better than no heart at all.”

At this moment, the only other things that Dean had on his person was the charm and the money that Elaine had given him and what remained of the Babylon candle.

It was a dumb idea and Dean knew it. It was also the only idea that he had.

The witch was nearly upon them. There was no time to consider how stupid this plan was.

“Castiel? Hold me tight and think of somewhere safe,” Dean ordered as he reached into his pocket and pulled out the stub of the candle. Without thinking about how much this was going to hurt, he shoved his hand into the flames, igniting the wick and the wax. He heard a shout and a gunshot, and then he and Castiel were engulfed in candlelight and were gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Most of Lamia's and Primus's dialogue is largely unchanged from the film. Portions of Dean and Castiel's dialogue is adapted from Tristan and Yvaine's actual dialogue, respectively. (This is true throughout the rest of the story, that I changed the dialogue only when it was required to make Dean sound like Dean or Castiel sound like Castiel, or where it was necessary because of situational changes.)
> 
> This is also (to the best of my memory) the only chapter in which Sam does not appear.


	8. The Rescue and the Capture

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam is rescued by a familiar but unexpected being.
> 
> Dean and Castiel learn why Elaine warned that it was essential to think of the _exact same place_ when using a Babylon candle.

Sam had tracked the hoof-prints until they came to a wide dirt track that was what likely passed for a road in Faerie. There the tracks had turned to follow the path, until they had become obscured by the tracks of several other horses and the ruts of some kind of wheeled vehicle.

It had begun to rain, and although Sam’s anxiety over his brother’s well-being urged him to run, he knew that in the dim beam of his flashlight and the poor weather, he was just as like as not to miss it if the hoof-prints he’d been tracking diverged from the road. Besides, he’d be of no use to Dean if he ran until he was too exhausted to fight, and he knew their luck too well to not assume that Dean would have gotten himself into trouble with some kind of monster while they’d been separated.

Even so, it was hours before Sam saw the inn, just as a flash of green illuminated it from within and then, to his horror, the green flash resolved into green flames that began to engulf the building. This may not have been Sam’s world, but he couldn’t believe that it was coincidental that something so strange would occur and Dean would not be caught up in it somehow.

Terrified that he would find Dean being immolated within the inn, Sam rushed in, taking a leap of faith through the flames that had engulfed the door. It was clear that the flames were not natural, for the room within was barely touched. His paranoia that something terrible was after the star, and by extension his brother, seemed to be correct. Indeed, there in the common room of the inn, Sam saw Dean backed up against a wall, surrounded by flames in all directions, standing defensively in front of Castiel.

Dean’s gun was drawn and Sam could see him pulling the trigger to no avail at the woman who stood before them, wielding a long knife that appeared to be made of obsidian. Unless Sam missed his guess entirely, he took her to be a witch. He reached for his gun, still loaded with witch-killing bullets meant for Elaine.

Dean hadn’t noticed Sam yet, and the witch was equally unaware of his presence. Her eyes were only for the star, and his frightened, fluttering heart. Sam lined up the shot and bellowed Dean’s name, just as Dean’s hand shot out into the flames, igniting the wick on the remaining portion of the Babylon candle.

Sam fired the gun but was blinded by the flash of light as the candle’s magic flooded throughout the inn. He wasn’t sure that his aim had been any good, or if his shot had gone wild.

The scream of fury from the witch suggested that he had missed his mark, and he was still fighting the flash burns on his retinas. If she was not likewise affected, Sam knew that his luck might very well have run out.

A hand closed around Sam’s wrist and yanked him nearly off his feet entirely. Sam tried to turn and face whatever had grabbed him, but everything was blurry or otherwise obscured by the fading afterglow of the candle. Whoever or whatever it was, Sam could only tell that they were shorter and probably stockier than himself, and they were probably male. This, at the very least, ruled out the witch, who was definitely female and willowy, and also wearing a dress. It didn’t mean that whoever had grabbed his wrist wasn’t associated with the witch, though. The strength of the man suggested that it might not be a man at all, but Sam didn’t have much time to react to that. The witch must have recovered a little because a blast of green fire nearly consumed him, missing only by a half a foot at most, and he was sure that even at that range his shirt was slightly scorched. The flames gave off an unnaturally intense heat.

The man dragged Sam away from the source of the flames, urging him into the darkness outside where Sam’s impaired vision was entirely useless. Sam stumbled into a run to keep up with his unknown rescuer? Kidnapper? Sam wasn’t sure. He supposed whoever or whatever this was, going with him was better than remaining in the burning inn with an enraged witch.

Several long minutes later, the man came to a stop. Sam’s vision was beginning to clear, and he could make out that they’d disappeared into the forest. He turned back for a moment, perhaps stupidly he realized, to find the green glow that he could still see in the distance through the trees.

His silent companion finally spoke, and the voice was one that Sam would know anywhere. A chill ran down his spine.

“So, what kind of stupidity brought you to Faerie? Listening to witches, now, and not just demons, huh?”

Sam turned, hoping that his ears were playing tricks on him, but knowing already who had come to his rescue. There was the Trickster, looking a little blurry, but unmistakably the very same pagan god that had killed Dean hundreds of times in that awful time loop only a few months before.

“You should know that Faerie witches aren’t as easy to kill as regular witches, so that witch-killer bullet was kinda suicidal, kiddo,” the Trickster continued, apparently unaware that Sam was having a minor mental breakdown. “Suppose I shouldn’t expect much else from you. Dean-o was in danger, so of course you have to go in guns blazing.” The Trickster shrugged. “You’re unexpectedly quiet. Got cursed or something already? I’d have figured you’d be more stabby already. What with all…” The Trickster waved his hand around, as if the rest of the statement should be obvious.

It was. What with the Trickster having killed Dean. Multiple times. Revealing exactly how deeply Sam would be broken without his brother. Without his last touchstone to anything approximating normality.

And that was the breaking point for Sam. In hindsight, Sam would realize how futile lunging for the Trickster and wrapping his hands around the god’s throat was. But in that moment, he forgot about the gun he’d shoved into his jeans as he’d run, he forgot that tricksters could only be killed by a wooden stake. He lunged and knocked the Trickster back into one of the massive oak trees, pinning the god there as he tried his level best to choke the life out of him.

The Trickster did at least sound a bit strangled as he struggled to talk. “Uh… I take it… back. This is… exactly… uh… what I was… expecting.” He gripped Sam’s hands and easily pried Sam’s fingers from his throat, giving Sam a little shove backwards to give himself some space. “That’s better. It’s not that I don’t get it, kid. I do. But I’m not your enemy here, and I’d kinda like to remain unstabbed and such, if you don’t mind.”

“Not my enemy?” repeated Sam, incredulous. “You killed Dean. Over and over and over again. You…” Words failed Sam entirely. There was no chance that the Trickster meant him any good. “Where’s Dean? Where’s Castiel? What did you do to them?” Sam spotted a low-hanging branch and snapped it free. Before the Trickster could stop him, Sam pointed the jagged edge at the Trickster’s throat.

“I dunno. They took a one-way trip by candle-light and I was too busy pulling your stupid ass out of green witch-flames to pay attention to exactly where that was. I didn’t do a thing to your idiot of a brother, or to Castiel. If they’re in trouble, it’s their own making, not mine,” the Trickster grumbled. “Just take it easy with the pointy stick, all right?”

“And you’re not working with that witch? You’re claiming that you’ve showed up to help out of the goodness of your nonexistent heart?” Sam growled, pushing the stick a little deeper into the flesh of the Trickster’s throat.

“Why would I be working with Elphaba back there? Use that big law school brain of yours, Sam, if I was working with her, why would I save you from being immolated? You don’t know where Dean and Castiel are, and you’re only going to be a thorn in the side of anyone hunting for them with ill intentions. Makes a lot more sense to let you become a cinder, if I was working with her, or if I meant either one any harm. But here you are, barely even scorched. So what does that tell you?” the Trickster said, quickly, even if he didn’t lose the mocking edge to his voice.

“Doesn’t mean that you don’t have ulterior motives,” Sam said after considering the Trickster’s questions.

The Trickster dipped his head ever so slightly, “Sure. Course I do. Just turns out that you and me want the same thing for the moment. I want to make sure that Castiel doesn’t get his heart ripped out by witches, and you want to find and protect big bro Dean, who conveniently happens to be the only thing standing between Castiel and said witches. Ergo… I help you find your brother, I find Castiel, everyone is happy and no one loses internal organs.”

“What if I don’t want your help?” Sam snapped. “What if I just want to run you through?”

“You know I’m the most powerful thing you’ve ever encountered. You’re deep in alien, maybe even enemy, territory, and you’re all alone now, with less than half the supplies you must have started with. You may not like me. Hell, you may even hate me. But right now, you’re not really in a position to be picky about allies, ya know?” the Trickster pointed out calmly. “So why don’t we dial back the hostility, put down the stick and talk like reasonable sentient entities?”

“You’re promising to help me find Dean, and to not harm him when we find him,” Sam asked, loosening his grip on the Trickster’s shirt collar and easing off the pressure on the point of the makeshift wooden stake.

“Yeah, yeah. I promise. I’ll help you find Dean and Castiel, and I won’t hurt your brother,” the Trickster agreed quickly. “Now will you please stop trying to crush and / or stab my neck?”

Sam released the little god and watched warily as he rubbed his neck in a very human-like gesture.

“Okay. So how, exactly, can you help?” Sam questioned.

The Trickster shrugged. “Protection, mostly, for when you inevitably run into something big and nasty that you aren’t prepared for. There’s certain tracking spells that I could try, but I’ll bet Castiel has enough sense to try to ward against most of them, now that he’s aware of witches being after him and I’m… Well, they’re not as effective over here as in the usual world. If we had some runes carved into dragon’s knuckles, we might be getting somewhere, but I lost mine in a poker game to Hermes, oh, three centuries ago.”

“In other words, whatever fantastic pagan magic you have is utterly useless for the finding half of your promise,” Sam deadpanned and hefted the stick threateningly again.

“Hey! Hey! I’m all kinds of awesome, you have no idea. It’s just that, yeah, my brand of pagan magic isn’t the most handy around these parts. So I guess, on the tracking end, I’m gonna have to defer to you. Got any idea where Dean-o would wish himself via fancy candle?”

Sam thought for a moment, “I have no idea. If he was thinking properly, he should have thought of Market, it’s the only place we’ve seen so far that isn’t a smoking crater or wilderness. But Castiel would have been thinking of a location, too, and…” Sam was suddenly worried. “What if they didn’t think of the same place, or didn’t have a destination in mind at all?”

The Trickster whistled. “Ooh boy. That would _not_ be good. Could be just about anywhere.” 

* * *

As it happened, Dean and Castiel were not just about anywhere. They happened to be about ninety miles away, to the southeast, and about seven thousand feet in the air, being pummeled by heavy rain and standing on a large bank of thunderclouds.

Neither star nor hunter was happy about their location.

“What the fuck!” Dean shouted in horror and jumped back from the edge of the damp, squishy… It couldn’t be a cloud that he was standing on! Clouds were just water vapor. But, son of a bitch, he could see the fucking ground, and it was a _long_ way down.

Castiel fell over backward, landing softly, if with a wet squelching sound, on the cloud, pushed over by Dean’s sudden movement. He looked very bedraggled, dark hair plastered to his skull and soft terrycotton robe quickly becoming heavy and laden with water in the downpour.

“How the hell are we on a cloud?!” Dean shouted, suddenly realizing there was something that he feared even more than flying in an airplane, and it was – apparently – floating on an impossible cloud in the middle of a thunderstorm.

Castiel answered him calmly, although not without a certain undercurrent of annoyance. “You said, think of being somewhere safe. So I thought of my home, in the sky. And clearly you thought of somewhere else, on the Earth, and so the candle did the best it could to accommodate both of us. And now, because of your lack of precision, we’re trapped someplace between the two, on a cloud in a thunderstorm.”

“Lack of precision?!” Dean bellowed. “You wanted me to give you step by step instructions when a freaking witch was about to turn me into a cinder and then cut your heart out? There wasn’t a lot of time for discussing exactly where our destination should be.”

Castiel tilted his head. “You cannot blame me for misinterpreting you. You should have realized that the only safe place I know is my home in the heavens.”

Dean gaped at the star, but before he could figure out a suitable response to that a _fishing net_ of all the improbable things fell over them and yanked them through the cloud bank and onto the wooden deck of what looked like an old sailing ship. If a sailing ship could float through the sky.

They were quickly surrounded by a rough looking group of men and women dressed in old-fashioned oilskin slickers, most in possession of what looked to be antique welding goggles. One shouted out: “Look, Captain Morgan! We’ve caught ourselves a little bonus! A couple of Lightning Marshals!”

A woman pushed forward through the crowd, and she examined them closely for just a moment, “Are you sure? They don’t look much like Lightning Marshals to me.”

The man that had incorrectly identified Castiel and Dean as Lightning Marshals removed his glasses and asked, not entirely insensibly, “Why else would anyone be up here in the middle of a storm?”

“I suppose that’s not a terrible question,” the woman pondered, seemingly unconcerned by the wind and the rain. “Perhaps they’re here for the same godforsaken reason that we are! Or perhaps they’re here for some reason of their own that we cannot fathom. But we can’t very well know until we ask, now can we?” She turned and regarded Dean and Castiel, and sharply asked, “Now, who are you?”

Dean and Castiel were still too shocked by this sudden and bizarre turn of events to do more than gape uselessly at her.

The woman, who presumably was Captain Morgan, shook her head and turned away, “Let’s see if a night on our lovely brig will loosen their lips. I can’t abide people who can’t answer a simple question. Go on! Take them to the brig!”

The man, who seemed to be the first mate, shouted: “You heard the lady! Let’s go!”

The net was pulled off of Dean and Castiel, and they soon found themselves being roughly escorted to the brig. The first mate shouted to the rest of the crew to get back to work. “We’ve got lightning to catch!” Just as, with deafening cracks of thunder, several bolts of lightning struck the wire net that stuck out from each side of the stern of the ship like wings made of wire mesh.

* * *

Once the crew had shoved Dean and Castiel into the brig, they bound the two of them together with a length of rope so that they were sat back to back on several large sacks of flour. It appeared that the little room they were imprisoned in was more often used as a store room than a prison, as there were all sorts of odds and ends surrounding them, but nothing that would have been useful for effecting an escape, even if they’d been able to reach any of it.

Castiel broke the silence first with a resigned declaration of: “They’re going to kill us, aren’t they?”

“Seems probable,” Dean agreed, gruffly. He was still in a very bad mood. First he’d ended up on a cloud, and now he was on a pirate ship that could fly? And the pirates were probably going to kill him. There was absolutely nothing about this situation that he liked and he felt like his heart might pound itself right out of his chest from the build-up of anxiety he was currently experiencing that he normally only felt when he was forced to go on a plane.

“I used to think that human adventures looked so interesting, back when I just observed them,” Castiel suddenly admitted, for no apparent reason. “I almost wished I could take part in one, back then. I did not imagine that if I were to end up in one, that this would be how it would turn out.”

“Ever heard of the expression ‘Be careful what you wish for?’” snapped Dean, wishing that Castiel would just stop talking so he could hum some Metallica in peace and try to calm himself down.

“I have,” Castiel said, still sounding completely calm, but Dean could feel the way that the star was beginning to shake. “It’s an expression humans use when they think someone wished for something they should not have and when that individual realized their wish and finds that it has unintended consequences, it is meant to say that those consequences were deserved for wishing in the first place. But I am not sure that having my heart cut out is deserved for occasionally entertaining the thought of what it might be like to have an adventure as and among humans. Perhaps I was mistaken?”

Dean shook his head. None of this was Castiel’s fault. Not really. And it hadn’t been fair to suggest, even unintentionally, that Castiel deserved to die for being curious about humans. “No. No. You just got the bad luck of getting saddled with me and Sam. Somehow we always end up in situations like this. Maybe you would have been fine if we hadn’t gotten involved.”

Castiel disagreed with this assessment immediately, “That seems unlikely. So far you and Sam are the only people I have met that do not seem to wish me harm, even if you did kidnap me. Except perhaps for Primus, and I am not entirely sure about that.”

“We never intended to kidnap anyone,” Dean muttered, regretfully. “When Elaine sent us here, we really thought we’d be collecting a meteorite. A magical one, sure, but just a lump of space rock. If it wasn’t for my deal, we wouldn’t have gotten so desperate.”

“It is all right. You and Sam are good people,” Castiel acknowledged. “I am glad that I got stuck with the two of you, as you say. You seem to be beating the alternatives quite handily, at the moment.”

Dean laughed. “I guess we are!” He frowned and fidgeted as much as the ropes would let him. The pirates certainly knew what they were doing when they tied people up. Dean couldn’t move an inch. “I _am_ worried about Sam. I think… I thought I heard him back at the inn.”

“I am sure that Sam will be all right.” Castiel sounded like he was trying to be reassuring, but there wasn’t nearly as much confidence in his voice as Dean would have liked to hear.

“I sold my soul for him, you know,” Dean muttered, feeling the weight of this now more than was normal. “I just. I don’t want that to be all for nothing. And I don’t… I don’t know what I would do without Sam.”

“He will be all right,” Castiel repeated, a little more forcefully this time, as if by willing it hard enough, he could make it come to pass.

“Thanks, dude,” Dean said. “I guess there are worse people to be tied up with in the brig of a flying pirate ship.”

“I will endeavor to remain so, then,” Castiel stated, and Dean could almost hear the slight smile in Castiel’s voice. “And Dean?”

“Yeah, Cas?” Dean asked.

“Thank you for saving me,” the star said, giving Dean’s hand a reassuring squeeze.

Dean felt a little odd. Not because he’d never been thanked for saving someone before, because he had. Sometimes at length and involving adventurous exploits in the bedroom if the individual doing the thanking was a woman and so inclined. It was different because he’d had some time to get to know Cas, and he wouldn’t be running off in the morning to evade the local cops who were wondering why that one grave had been desecrated in the night, and all the neighbors remembered seeing that one guy with that one car lurking around the cemetery.

It was kind of a nice feeling, sharing this kind of connection with someone who wasn’t family and he didn’t have to leave immediately.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's where I feel the need to apologize!
> 
> I adore Captain Shakespeare! I really do!
> 
> However, when I tried to imagine Dean interacting with him, my imagination apparently reached its Schwarzschild's radius and collapsed into a singularity from which no ideas could escape. What little Hawking radiation worth of ideas I could collect from outside of the event horizon was utter crack, and I quickly came to the conclusion that I needed to make a casting change.
> 
> My additional justifications for doing so is one (1) secret reason which I hope will be satisfying when I eventually reveal it, and also because I felt that I'd eliminated the main heroine of the story in favor of giving her role to Castiel and I thought that it might be good to add in some more female representation to offset that.
> 
> Captain Jane Morgan shares a lot of traits with Captain Shakespeare (including naming herself after her favorite author, Jane Austen) but for those of you who may be upset... I like to think that Captain Shakespeare does exist in the universe of this story, and that the two captains probably know one another. It just so happens that it was Morgan and not Shakespeare who encountered Dean and Castiel.


	9. Alliance and Interrogation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and the Trickster agree to a truce, while Dean and Castiel are interrogated by the pirate's captain.

There was a bright flash of greenish light in the direction that the fake inn had stood.

Sam took a few hesitant steps toward it, trying to see what was going on. He wasn’t sure what he feared more, that the witch had the means to follow Dean and Castiel wherever they had gone or that the flash of light was a harbinger of the witch following him and the Trickster in order to finish them off before they could cause her any more trouble.

“That’ll be the witch dismissing the inn she magicked up,” the Trickster commented, as he joined Sam in peering through the trees toward the place that the false inn had stood only moments before. “She’ll probably leave as quickly as she can. Probably steal that nice carriage and the horses, too.”

“Any chance that she’ll come looking for us?” Sam asked. He knew from experience that witches tended to not like leaving behind witnesses, and if she was going to come looking for him to finish him off, she’d likely want to do it now, when he was tired and reeling from all that had just occurred.

“That’s doubtful. She’s after Castiel. She won’t bother trying to hunt you down. She won’t figure it’s worth the effort,” the Trickster said with a casual shrug. “And I doubt she even noticed me at all.”

“That’s difficult to believe,” Sam grumbled, thinking about the outlandishness that the Trickster had come up with when they’d first hunted him in Ohio.

The Trickster gave Sam a confused look.

“You’re not typically all that subtle,” Sam pointed out.

“Hey now! I can be plenty subtle. I was subtle when I was pretending to be that janitor,” the Trickster protested.

Sam shook his head, “You told us all about how much sex you’d had the one night. That isn’t very subtle.”

“It was the part I was playing!” the Trickster defended.

Sam didn’t say anything, he just pointedly stared at the Trickster.

“Fine. All right,” the Trickster relented with a sigh. “I don’t tend to stay subtle for very long. Still, all I did this time was step in and get you out of there. I didn’t exactly stick around to introduce myself. Not that I would ever want to. Anyway, I’m pretty sure she was too busy being pissed that she broke her fancy knife to notice much else. Seeing as it does take a very special weapon to harvest a star’s heart, I doubt she had a spare.”

This was surprisingly reassuring to Sam. “So what now?” He sagged a little, leaning against a tree as he fought unsuccessfully against a yawn. The adrenaline that had kept him going for the last several hours appeared to be finally wearing off.

The Trickster regarded him for a few moments. “I think our first order of business ought to be to find an inn that isn’t run by a witch and let you get a bath and a decent night’s sleep. Hate to break it to you, Sam, but you look like Hell and you stink to high heaven.”

“Thanks,” mumbled Sam, trying for sarcasm but having the effect ruined by yawning halfway through the word.

The Trickster grabbed his wrist. “Come on! There’s a real inn a few more miles up the road. Let’s go get you a real bed.”

* * *

The Trickster was good to his word about the presence of an inn up the road. It was a small inn, nearly full at this late hour, and the rooms were cramped, but somehow the Trickster smooth-talked the proprietor into giving them a room with two beds and a bathtub. Unfortunately, that was about all there was to it.

After the bath had been drawn up, the Trickster disappeared into the common room while Sam washed up, for which Sam was very glad. He was grimy enough that he probably would have stripped down and washed up even if the Trickster had decided to stay and make lewd comments, because at this point Sam would have endured nearly anything to feel clean again. But the Trickster had made some remark about seeing a very specific form of mead on tap downstairs that was impossible to get in the human world anymore, and so had left to give Sam some privacy.

Sam wasn’t sure how the Trickster knew when he’d finished bathing (the water in that tub looked disgusting when he was done with it, but he certainly felt much better), but the Trickster returned within minutes of Sam pulling on some clean boxers and pajama pants. He’d already collapsed into the bed, which was slightly too small for him and might also have bed bugs, when the Trickster reappeared. It was dark in the room now that Sam had blown out the candles and lanterns, but Sam could still make out the Trickster’s silhouette and a glint of gold from his hair as it caught the moonlight.

“Night, Sam,” the Trickster murmured, just as Sam let his exhaustion take him. He was asleep before he knew it.

* * *

Sam woke to the sound of Dean rummaging through his things. This motel bed he was sleeping on was abnormally short and uncomfortable this morning, and Sam couldn’t remember exactly where they’d crashed for the night. He rolled over, intending to ask Dean what the hell he was looking for.

It wasn’t Dean that was picking through his gear. The Trickster was just setting aside his sawed-off shotgun and picking up his machete from the very bottom of his duffel bag and looking it over with a mildly befuddled look on his face.

“Get the hell out of my stuff!” Sam yelped, recalling that he was in Faerie, that Dean and Castiel were missing, and that he’d somehow ended up making an alliance with the Trickster of all creatures. He scrambled to snatch the machete out of the Trickster’s hands, and then noticed how most of his stuff was scattered haphazardly around the room. It was clear how the Trickster had been entertaining himself overnight.

“What?” the Trickster complained, holding his hands up innocently. “I wanted to see if you had anything actually useful in there.”

“I don’t care. Just… keep out of my stuff, Trickster,” Sam snapped, gathering his things and shoving them back in the bag as quickly as he could without breaking anything.

“I mean, most of the weapons aren’t bad,” the Trickster offered, “and I guess food is important. Can’t have you starving on me. Defeats the purpose of playing nice and all. But the clothes are probably going to be a problem.” The Trickster looked down at himself. “Come to think of it, so are mine.”

The Trickster was wearing an olive-green jacket over a dark button-down shirt and blue jeans, nothing that Sam thought was particularly ostentatious. And then it occurred to Sam what the Trickster meant. These were perfectly normal clothes for their own world, but Faerie seemed to be a few centuries behind the times when it came to just about everything, including clothing styles.

The Trickster snapped his fingers and was suddenly wearing a loose-fitting linen shirt under a dark green vest, both were cinched at the waist with a belt. He’d kept the jeans, although they were now brown instead of blue.

“That’s a little better,” the Trickster remarked smugly, and raised his hand to snap again.

“Whoa!” shouted Sam, guessing what the Trickster was about to do and wanting no part in it. “What are you doing?!”

“You can’t very well go about wearing that much plaid; you’ll stand out like a sore thumb!” the Trickster complained. “And it’s probably best that we don’t make it any easier for witches to track us than necessary. Fat lot of good we’d do Castiel if the witch followed us right to him.”

Sam didn’t like the idea of the Trickster using his powers on him. He didn’t like that at all.

The Trickster seemed to catch on to his hesitance. “It’s not as if there’s any place around here to buy clothes, and even if there were, it’s not like we could buy anything off the rack that would even fit you, you giant. I promise not to do anything weird to you. Just snap up some clothes that’ll fit you and won’t look too out of place for around here.”

Sam considered this. The Trickster had made some good points. They were in the middle of nowhere, so it did seem unlikely that they’d be able to purchase any clothes for Sam in the near future. And Sam’s clothing did stand out. He’d noticed that as far back as when he’d been in Market with Dean.

“All right,” Sam finally decided. “You can magic up some nondescript clothes for me.”

“Great!” the Trickster said and immediately snapped his fingers.

To go from wearing only pajama bottoms to being fully clothed in something that wouldn’t have been out of place at a Renaissance festival in only an instant was a strange sensation. Sam looked down at himself. The Trickster had put him in a linen shirt that was entirely covered up by a black jerkin, and over that was a warm grey jacket that reminded Sam of his FBI overcoat but shorter. He, too, was permitted to keep wearing jeans, although his were very faded black. The Trickster had even upgraded him to sturdy leather boots. Everything fit comfortably, and there was even a belt with a couple of his knives already sheathed on it, and he had a proper shoulder holster for the gun he normally concealed in his jeans.

He nodded, acknowledging that the Trickster had done good work.

“Right!” the Trickster announced. “Now that we’ve handled that, let’s get out that map of yours and decide where Dean and Castiel likely ended up.”

Sam almost asked the Trickster how he knew about the map, but it quickly occurred to him that the Trickster had been going through his things and had probably encountered the map then.

This was confirmed the moment that the Trickster pulled the map from under a stack of MREs.

Sam stepped closer as the Trickster spread the map out on a clear patch of table. The Trickster didn’t take very long before he jabbed his finger at a certain bend in a particular road that cut through a long swath of wilderness.

“We are here,” the Trickster declared.

Sam couldn’t find any reason to disbelieve the Trickster’s assertion. The place he’d pointed to seemed to match up with what he’d seen of the road as he’d travelled down it the night before, and it was within a few days travel of the point on the map that Castiel had thought he’d fallen upon.

“Now, I couldn’t tell exactly where Dean and Castiel were headed, but I thought that I caught sight of their candle-flash headed off in a southeasterly direction,” the Trickster commented. “I tried a few tracking spells while you were sleeping, but none of them were particularly effective. I didn’t have the right ingredients to work with and, unfortunately, neither did you. But I think Castiel is somewhere in this region.

The Trickster gestured to yet another area on the map, a good ways to the southeast of their location. Many dozens of miles if Sam had any feel for the scale of the map. “I couldn’t get a good fix, and I’m not sure if it’s because Castiel’s already attempted to do some warding magic, or it’s because they’ve managed to hitch a ride on something that can move awful fast, or if there’s something else throwing me off, but I can’t seem to pin them down any better than that.” The Trickster seemed frustrated with himself and the limitations of what he’d tried.

Sam pulled the map toward himself and examined the region that the Trickster had indicated. There wasn’t that much there, mostly more wilderness, but it was somewhat closer to the Wall than he and the trickster currently were.

“Trick-” Sam cut himself off, before he could finish saying ‘Trickster’. He had called his… ally that a few times now already, and it was just now that he realized that the trickster probably had a proper name. Tricksters were a subtype of pagan god after all. This was just as rude as referring to Castiel as ‘the star’. “Uh, is there something I could call you, other than Trickster?”

The Trickster seemed surprised by this question, as if he’d fully expected Sam to continue referring to him as such and had had no intention whatsoever to offer up an actual name. “Well, I do have a name, if that’s what you’re asking,” the Trickster evaded, a brief flicker of panic appearing in his eye.

“Yeah, but what should I call you?” Sam asked. “I feel a little funny calling you Trickster all the time. Kinda like if you decided to call me ‘Human’, you know?”

“You’ll excuse me if I don’t want to tell you my real name,” the Trickster grumbled, running his hand through his hair. “The next thing I know you’ll be summoning me every time you get a hang nail or something. Or using it to figure out a better way to stab me. Probably will depend on how this whole truce thing goes.”

“Don’t you have any aliases or something that you don’t mind me calling you by?” Sam asked.

“Fine, fine. Ah… I guess… you could call me… Gabe,” the Trickster decided, hesitantly. “I’ve used that name before, I’ll respond to it just fine.”

“Cool. Gabe,” Sam said, finding this entire conversation just a little surreal. Just yesterday he couldn’t have imagined being in close proximity to the Trickster without wanting to kill him, never mind asking the Trickster for a name he could call him by.

“So, Gabe, you said you thought Dean and Castiel might be moving,” Sam said, returning to the actual problem at hand. “Do you know what direction they were headed in?”

Gabe leaned over the map and thought about it for a moment, before tracing their heading. “Southwest.”

“That’d put them on course for the nearest settlement being… ah… Portown, on Mount Drummond,” Sam read the tiny label.

“That’d make sense,” Gabe agreed. “But I doubt we’d make it there in time to catch them. Even so, it’d be easier to track them if we’re actually in a spot where they’ve been recently. And maybe Portown sells magic ingredients. Or runes. Runes would be very helpful.”

“Okay, then we’re agreed,” Sam said, straightening up and folding the map. “I’ll pack up my stuff, and we’ll head to Mount Drummond.”

“One problem, Sam,” Gabe said with a shake of his head. “There is no direct route to Mount Drummond from here.”

Sam referred to the map, to confirm what Gabe had said. “Then we’ll cut cross country here.” Sam pointed to a large area of swamp land that didn’t look topographically difficult to cross, even if that did raise the question of why there was no attempt to build a road through it.

Gabe shrugged. “It’s your call. You’re the expert at travelling like a human. But I’m not sure that going off the road in Faerie is wise, kid.”

“It’ll save time, won’t it? And I’m not your average civilian that stumbled into Faerie, and it’s not like I’m without backup. Or are you saying that Faerie is too dangerous for a pagan god?”

Gabe sputtered. “It is not! Just don’t blame me if you get turned into a moose or something when you step on the wrong flower.”

* * *

The early morning sunlight was just beginning to stream through one of the portholes into the brig when the door swung open.

Captain Morgan looked different without her shapeless black mass of an oilskin rainslicker. She was dressed in laborer’s trousers and wore a linen shirt under a long dark overcoat. A saber rested at her hip. Dean guessed her age to be no more than thirty-five.

She pulled up a tiny stool from a corner of the brig and sat down on it, facing Dean, and pushed frizzy brown hair out of her face.

“So! Are you ready to tell me who you are and what you’re doing up here?” Captain Morgan asked, leaning in close to Dean, so that he had no choice but to meet her unusual eyes. One was bright blue and the other was green.

“My name is Dean Winchester, and my friend here is Cas,” Dean answered slowly. 

“My name is Castiel,” interrupted Castiel, sounding slightly miffed by the sudden use of a nickname.

“And you see, we heard that thunderstorm coming on last night. And we thought, ya know, the best place to watch a storm would be from a cloud. And we had this little boat. So we took a little sightseeing trip and our boat got wrecked. It’s really awesome that you came along and found us, really,” Dean lied quickly, trying to ignore Castiel’s interjection.

Captain Morgan didn’t say anything immediately. She frowned and stood, circling the two of them. “Dean and Castiel,” she repeated, considering. “I think you’re telling me the truth about that at least.”

“Honest to god!” Dean exclaimed, trying to sound sincere and falling ever so slightly short of the mark. “That’s what happened. We got shipwrecked. Or boat-wrecked.”

“I know a lie when I hear one,” Captain Morgan said coolly. “I would very much appreciate the truth before I lose my patience and start cutting off appendages.”

She pulled out a knife from somewhere within her coat and flipped it a couple of times for emphasis.

Castiel shivered and quickly broke the silence to state in his matter-of-fact way: “We attempted to use a Babylon candle and it went awry.” He paused for a moment and then hesitantly tacked on, “We were attempting to visit his brother?”

This elicited a hearty laugh from the pirate captain. “Really? You expect me to believe that the two of you were travelling by _candlelight_? For a social call? I’ve never heard a more atrocious lie.”

She grabbed Dean’s hand and pressed the knife to his ring finger. “Now. I’ll ask one more time. And if you lie to me, I’ll start cutting a finger off for each lie I hear. Do you understand? What are the two of you doing up here?”

“We already fucking told you…” Dean began indignantly.

This was not what Captain Morgan had wanted to hear, so she pressed the blade down until she began to draw blood.

“Fuck! This is all that goddamn witch’s fault. Shouldn’t have ever gone to Witch’s Wood!” Dean yelped, trying and failing to pull away from the knife.

“What did you say?” Captain Morgan said, sounding surprised for the very first time.

Dean was livid, and so he didn’t censor what he thought of the witch that had sent him to Faerie in the first place, especially after having most of the previous night to recontextualize her motivations with the knowledge that witches liked to eat the hearts of fallen stars: “I said Elaine Morgan is a bitch and she’s behind this entire mess somehow. Promised that she could break a demon contract. Bitch of a witch probably lied!”

“You must be lying,” Captain Morgan snapped. “Prove to me that you’ve met Emma.”

“Emma?” Dean muttered in confusion, not sure when he’d lost the thread of the conversation.

“Now!” Captain Morgan shouted. “Or I will cut your friend’s throat.” She pressed her blade against Castiel’s neck.

“I don’t know an Emma!” Dean shouted, struggling against the ropes desperately. He was a dead man already, his contract was so close to being up, but he did not want to be responsible for Cas’s death.

“The witch of Witch’s Wood,” Captain Morgan clarified. “Prove to me that you know her. NOW!”

Dean wracked his brains to think of anything that would prove that he’d met the witch of Witch’s Wood. “Around my other wrist! Around my other wrist there’s an agate she enchanted. Said it was some kind of protection, I think.”

Captain Morgan removed her blade from where it had been pressed to Castiel’s neck. The star let out a long exhale of relief. She walked around to the other side of Dean and knelt to examine the leather cord that was tied around his wrist. She brushed her fingers along the tiny little agate, which warmed slightly at her touch.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Captain Morgan murmured. “It’s Emma’s handiwork for sure.”

She got back to her feet and paced for a moment, lost in her own thoughts, before she strode across the brig and flung open the door.

Her crew had been perched outside the door, listening intently to the exchange within.

“Cut them loose and send them to my quarters,” she ordered her first mate. “I wish to talk to them privately.”

She eyed the rest of the crew. “Our guests and I will be retiring to my cabin! We are not to be disturbed! As for the rest of you. Get on with your work. I’ll have no lollygagging aboard MY ship!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, I am not quite adhering to my posting schedule because I will be starting college classes this week. Therefore expect a minor changes until I discover the least disruptive posting schedule.


	10. Limbus Grass and the Captain of the Sky-ship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gabe and Sam have a chance encounter on the road.
> 
> Meanwhile, Dean and Castiel find out what the captain intends to do with them.

Fortunately, despite the mess that Gabe had made of Sam’s things, it hadn’t taken terribly long to pack everything away again. Gabe had insisted that he be allowed to put some of the unneeded items in a pocket dimension for retrieval at a later date, but Sam had been adamant that none of his things be vanished. Gabe had eventually been convinced to let the subject drop after Sam had rightfully pointed out that he’d be carrying his things anyway, so it really ought to make no difference whatsoever to Gabe if Sam was carrying a little more than necessary.

After paying the innkeeper, they set out on the road. They’d be following it for a little while yet, until it started to detour fifty miles or more out of their way to the north, at which point they intended to cross a large swamp that the road insisted on going around.

Sam was surprised when it turned out that Gabe was a mostly silent traveling companion. He flinched each time Gabe snapped his fingers, but Gabe was never doing anything more than creating some candies to munch on. Sam recalled what Bobby had said about tricksters and realized that Gabe would likely be doing this quite often to satisfy his trickster’s metabolism. However, Sam was surprised by how mechanically Gabe ate the candy, as if it was a bit of a chore that he didn’t particularly want to do but was doing anyway. If anything, Sam had expected that Gabe would luxuriate in even the simple hedonism of indulging in sweets.

* * *

It was sometime in the midafternoon when Gabe grabbed Sam’s shirtsleeve.

“Look there,” Gabe said, pointing to a dip in the roadside, sheltered by a large boulder and out of sight from the road, but from which a wisp of campfire smoke was floating up in the still air.

Sam caught the smell of something being roasted, and his stomach growled loudly at the thought and smell of something more palatable than the meals-ready-to-eat that he’d been consuming for the past week or so. Gabe gave him a mischievous smile that sent an instinctive chill down Sam’s spine, even though he was reasonably sure that Gabe wasn’t about to do anything malicious. 

“Let’s see if they’re willing to share, huh?” Gabe suggested.

Sam considered protesting, but Gabe had already darted away, motioning for Sam to follow when he hesitated. Sam sighed in defeat and followed Gabe off the road.

An elderly and somewhat rotund woman with wild orange hair shot through with grey was tending to a cooking fire next to a large yellow caravan. A dun draft horse was grazing nearby. She startled at Gabe and Sam’s appearance, shakily calling out, “Who goes there? What do you want with me, a poor old flower…”

“Sorry, ma’am,” Sam instantly replied, slipping into the same tone of voice he used when he was impersonating an FBI agent. “We didn’t mean to startle you.”

“No siree,” Gabe sing-songed. “We just happened to see your cookfire’s smoke and thought maybe you’d be willing to share some food with a couple of fellow travelers? This behemoth you see here is Sam, and you can call me Gabe.”

“I am Madame Seleme,” the woman introduced herself, straightening up slightly and considering the both of them with sly, calculating eyes. “I haven’t much food to spare, as you can see, but I’d be willing to share what I have, if you’re willing to trade me something worthwhile.”

Sam wasn’t sure that he had anything of real value to trade. He had the coins and gems that Elaine had given him, but he had the feeling that Madame Seleme was not interested in money. Elaine’s agate charm seemed to weigh heavily on its leather cord around his neck.

“Would some griffin feathers do?” Gabe interrupted Sam’s thoughts, drawing three bluish-grey feathers from a pouch at his side.

Madame Seleme leaned forward excitedly. “Yes!” She reached for them, but Gabe pulled the feathers back from her grasping hands.

“Here’s the deal, I’ll give you one feather now, and then we eat, and I’ll give you the other two,” Gabe said decisively. “Just so we know that nobody’s gonna pull a fast one on each other.”

Madame Seleme smiled graciously. “Of course, that’s only fair.” Gabe handed over a single feather and she gestured at some large stones near the fire. “Take a seat, take a seat! The hare will be done in a moment.”

* * *

“So, what do you want to share, heads or tails?” Madame Seleme tapped the front and back half of the roasted hare that she’d soon placed upon a wooden chopping block.

“Tails,” Gabe answered. “I’m not terribly peckish at the moment, but I’m sure Sam here will let me snag a bit of dark meat from him.”

“It’s your griffin feathers,” Madame Seleme said with a shrug, and with a swift strike of a large butcher knife, the hare was in two. She put some extra seasoning on it, and soon Sam was presented with a plate to eat his meal.

Sam had eaten about half of the hare he’d been given, and Gabe had (perhaps for appearances’ sake) snatched several bites from Sam’s plate, when Madame Seleme began to strike up conversation.

“So, where are the two of you gentlemen headed off to on this fine day?”

Sam gave her a gentle smile and answered: “We’re searching for my brother and the fallen star he’s gotten lost with. We think they might be headed to Portown, on Mount Drummond, so we hope to catch up to them there…”

He froze, dropping the piece of meat he’d been about to eat. Gabe was looking at him in shock and no small amount of horror. He hadn’t meant to say any of that. He’d intended to say that he was on his way to meet with his brother further up the road, and he hadn’t the faintest idea what had motivated him to say so much to a complete stranger.

“A fallen star, you say?” Madame Seleme said with a dark chortle. “That’s the best news I’ve had in ages. I could do with losing a few years meself.”

“You fed him limbus grass!” Gabe shouted, leaping to his feet, clearly enraged. “You… you… you tried to truth serum the both of us!”

Sam didn’t feel very well, and he wasn’t sure if it was because he’d put Dean in even greater danger than he’d been in before or if the limbus grass was mildly toxic to humans.

Gabe didn’t seem to notice that Sam was swaying a bit on his seat, he was too busy being livid. “You’re a witch,” he stated, voice hard and dark.

Madame Seleme didn’t seem to be terribly concerned about Gabe’s anger or his accusation. “So what if I am? You’ve got a good enough dose that you’ll hardly be a threat.” She moved to snap her fingers, no doubt to finish them off with whatever magic she had at her disposal. Sam felt too light-headed to move.

Gabe lunged too quickly for Seleme to react and had her wrist in a crushing grip immediately. “I’m no mortal, little witch. And I won’t have any more of your kind searching for that fallen star.”

“A god!” she yelped in surprise and fright. “It was a mistake! I shall not seek the star, Loki Odinson. I shall not.”

Gabe (or was he really Loki?) snarled, “You will fucking not. And it won’t matter. You won’t remember us at all.” He jabbed her hard in the middle of the forehead with two outstretched fingers of his free hand in a motion reminiscent of the gesture that Castiel had used to give Dean his caffeine fix. “Seek the star all you wish, witch. You shall not see the star, touch it, smell or hear it. You will not perceive him even if he were to stand before you.” He snapped his fingers and Seleme seemed to struggle to recognize what was going on. “Pray you never encounter me again, Ditchwater Sal, and here’s the rest of your sorry payment.” Gabe tossed the remaining griffin feathers to the ground.

Sam nearly fell off the stone he’d been precariously perched on for the entire exchange. Distantly he recognized that the limbus grass must be knocking him out as surely as a roofie would.

“Sam?” Gabe (Loki?) was at his side, pulling an arm over his shoulders and helping Sam to stand.

“Shit,” Gabe swore, trying to get Sam to walk back to the road and away from the dazed and confused witch. “I know you’re kinda out of it, kid, but you really need to work with me here a little. We need to get away from her.”

“’kay,” Sam slurred. “Imma tryin’.”

Sam wasn’t sure how he found himself tucked up against a different boulder, well and truly sheltered from any passerby, but he did. Everything was strange and confused. The Trickster was there, coming in and out of his line of sight, and seemed to be worrying over him. Which was odd. The Trickster was a dangerous and cunning pagan god, not someone to fret and insist that Sam try to drink some water. But it didn’t really matter, because soon enough Sam found the blackness engulfing him, and he didn’t have to worry about it anymore.

* * *

Dean and Cas found themselves being “escorted” to the captain’s quarters. Captain Morgan’s quarters were, apparently, an elegant stateroom and associated suite of rooms at the stern of the ship. Dean and Cas were given a shove into the large room, to find the captain with her back to them, observing the early morning clouds from the large bay windows.

The door swung shut behind them, and Captain Morgan turned to them, hands still behind her back with a solemn expression.

“You’ve met Emma,” she said. “She gave you one of her enchanted stones. That indicates to me that she means to help you. But I don’t appreciate what you called her. So, I’d very much like to know how you met her and for what purpose she’s sent you into Stormhold. She wouldn’t let you cross without having a _reason_.”

Dean looked over at Cas. Elaine was a witch, and witches apparently wanted to cut out stars’ hearts and eat them. Still, it seemed that the pirate captain was on good terms with Elaine and had become a lot less hostile since realizing that Dean had met with her and had been sent into Faerie by her.

“So… that’s a funny story,” Dean had decided to tell an edited version of the truth. “Elaine killed a couple of assholes and my brother and I thought she might be an evil witch, so we came to gank her.”

‘_Gank?_’ mouthed Captain Morgan, clearly confused by the word.

“Kill,” Dean corrected himself. “We came to kill her, before she could hurt anyone else. But it was a misunderstanding. She cleared it up before anyone could get shot.”

Cas was listening intently to Dean’s story, and Dean realized that they’d never actually told him the whole story about how they’d ended up meeting with Elaine and coming to Faerie in the first place.

“Turned out my brother had wanted to speak with her because there was this story about her being able to break demon contracts,” Dean continued.

Captain Morgan nodded sagely, but broke in with: “Why would you ever be interested in that? Surely you wouldn’t be so foolish as to get involved with _those_ things?”

Dean tried not to be offended but failed to keep his annoyance from his retort, “Well, I sold my soul to bring my brother back from the dead. Sam’s been trying to figure out how to break the contract ever since.”

The captain frowned, but there was a glimmer of compassion in her expression. “I see. I can see why Emma might have wanted to help, then.”

Dean shrugged, feeling uncomfortably pitied, “She claimed that if we retrieved a certain object from Faerie, she’d be able to use it to break the contract without killing Sam. And while we were looking for it, we sorta… bumped into Cas. And then we had a run-in with a not-so-friendly witch and Sam and us got separated. That’s how we really ended up in the clouds.”

Captain Morgan considered this all for what felt a long time. She appeared to come to decision and in so doing her entire posture relaxed. She smiled brightly.

“Well, then,” she said, clapping her hands together excitedly. “If Emma meant to help you and your brother, you _simply_ must allow me to offer my aid.”

“We do not mean to appear unappreciative, Captain Morgan…” Cas began, only to be interrupted.

“No, no!” she laughed. “No need to stand on ceremony. Please, call me Jane.”

“We do not mean to appear unappreciative, Jane,” Cas corrected himself, “but I confess that I am confused as to how you know a witch from across the Wall. Are the two of you friends?”

Jane didn’t answer immediately as she crossed the room to stand beside a large mirror. She seemed to be considering her response. “I knew Emma when I was little,” she explained. “I used to live in the human world, before Emma helped me cross into Faerie. I’m not sure if you could really call us friends, but we’ve kept up a correspondence for nearly a century now.”

“You’re from the human world?” Dean couldn’t help but be surprised by this news.

“I was,” Jane nodded. “I didn’t fit in very well there, so Emma helped me find a place where I would. I owe her a debt for that.”

She twisted a lighting fixture and a panel swung open to reveal a massive walk-in closet. It was filled to the brim with fancy clothing of every description, dresses and suits alike.

“To start with, I insist that you allow me to help the both of you get cleaned up and into less absurd clothing,” Jane announced. “So please, take your pick of anything that you think will fit.”

“That’s unnecessary…” Cas began, looking bewildered and overwhelmed by the large selection of clothing within the hidden closet.

Jane approached him and gently laid a hand on his shoulder, “Sweetie, you’re wearing a bathrobe. And it’s no trouble for me to give you something.”

Dean was still reeling a little from the drastic change in demeanor in the captain. She’d gone from embodying the coldest of killers to being a warm and generous host. And it was more than a little stunning to him that she owned such a vast array of vibrantly colored and elaborate dresses. He wouldn’t have thought that someone so clearly capable of violence and discipline could enjoy something so seemingly frivolous.

“If you insist,” Cas interrupted Dean’s thoughts, as he finally decided to step forward into the closet.

Dean hesitated to join Cas, and found that he couldn’t contain his curiosity, “Why do you have so many fancy clothes anyway?”

Jane smiled brightly. “A few reasons. As far as my reputation and my crew is concerned, these are for when I need to infiltrate someplace that only the wealthy and the well-dressed can be admitted into. Lots of opportunities to steal jewels and other valuables if you can walk straight into a castle pretending to be a guest.”

Dean nodded. That was perfectly sensible and more than a little James Bond. It maybe didn’t explain the sheer number of dresses, though.

“On the other hand,” Jane continued, running her hands through the satiny material of some nearby dresses, “just because I play-act at being the most bloodthirsty of pirates – and I must tell you both that it is primarily an act – I still do entertain the part of my heart that loves to put on beautiful dresses. I suppose I’m still young at heart and never really ever wanted to fully outgrow that fantasy of putting on a beautiful gown and pretending to be a princess from time to time.”

She beamed brightly, pulling at Dean’s arm to show him a selection of clothes that seemed to be approximately the right size for him. “And, of course, I make sure that everything I have comes with pockets. I simply cannot resist a dress that has pockets.”

“As for these,” she indicated the men’s clothing that was far too big for her, “I do raid passenger ships from time to time and end up with a haul of luggage. Some of the clothes may not fit me, but I’m loathe to part with them. Just in case my crew is ever in need of something nice to wear. I’m always convinced that the very moment I let something go, I’ll find myself in need of that precise thing.”

Cas appeared to have become enamored with a tan overcoat but seemed otherwise befuddled by the large number of choices for pants and shirts and vests to go with it. Jane glanced over at him but shook her head fondly.

“A moment, dear, and I’ll be right with you. I think I have just the thing for your handsome friend here,” she said.

And suddenly Dean found himself with an armful of clothing that included: one pair of heavy denim-like pants in pale grey, a pair of calf-high boots, a button-down leather overcoat, and a linen shirt, and a waistcoat in light green.

“I think these will look very nice on you,” Jane remarked to Dean, before leading him into a smaller side room just off of her stateroom where he could wash up and change.

By the time Dean had finished cleaning up (as he couldn’t find it in himself not to take the opportunity to feel somewhat less grimy), he wandered back out to find that Jane had convinced Cas to put on new clothes, too.

The tan overcoat was an unsurprising choice, but she’d helped him to complete the ensemble with a black vest with silver accents over a white shirt, dark pants and a pair of boots similar to the pair she’d given Dean.

“Much better, don’t you think?” she commented to Dean, nudging him with her elbow.

Cas did look good. Although bedraggled bathrobe wasn’t a precisely high bar to clear when it came to fashion.

Cas cleared his throat to get their attention. “Perhaps now that you’ve fixed our wardrobe to your satisfaction, we might move on to other business?”

“Of course, of course,” Jane agreed. “We’ll be making port at Mount Drummond tomorrow. I simply cannot afford to delay in offloading the lightning we caught last night. And perhaps we’ll be lucky and can find you another candle so that you can return to your brother. Although I’ll admit that it’s unlikely. Babylon candles are vanishingly rare. However, we can make inquiries about the whereabouts of your brother at the very minimum. And in the meantime, you’re welcome to the guest quarters.”


	11. The Marsh and the Black Market

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Gabe travel through the marsh.
> 
> Dean and Castiel visit the black market in Portown.

Sam woke to a sky covered in a blanket of vibrant stars.

“Welcome back to the world of the living,” Gabe’s voice filtered through the dark. “How are you doing, kid?”

Sam sat up slowly and with a groan. His thoughts still felt like he was swimming through mental molasses, but he didn’t think he was going to pass out again. “A little hungover, I think.”

“Limbus grass is pretty rough on humans,” Gabe stated. “Feeling a little muddled is pretty normal.”

Sam got to his feet and felt for his duffel bag. Gabe pushed it into his hands and Sam began to search for a flashlight. “We should get moving. We lost a lot of time.”

Gabe didn’t respond.

“What? Is there something wrong with that?” Sam asked, concerned that there was some reason that they shouldn’t risk journeying at night.

“No. You’re right. I just don’t really like the idea of traveling at night. Faerie’s bad enough during the day,” Gabe agreed after a short pause.

* * *

A few hours of walking in the dark later, Sam was feeling more like himself. The worst of the fog in his mind had lifted and he no longer felt like he was stumbling like a drunkard as he walked.

“Hey, Gabe?” Sam questioned, breaking the silence that had so far only been punctuated by the sound of their footfalls on the dirt of the road and the occasional sounds of Gabe’s candy wrappers.

“Yeah?” Gabe answered, warily, pausing in his chewing of a conjured chocolate bar.

“That witch called you Loki,” Sam stated, carefully. He turned his head slightly so he could watch how Gabe reacted.

“She did,” Gabe agreed, face impassive, and not elaborating.

“That’s who you are, isn’t it?” Sam continued.

Gabe remained silent for several long moments, “Caught me out, haven’t you? Big mouth on that witch.”

Sam took a moment to think this over before he said anything else. So the Trickster was the Norse trickster god known as Loki. As gods went, Loki was still pretty well known, probably even still had followers. It explained why the Trickster had always been so unusually powerful compared to most monsters and pagans that they’d encountered. “Should I call you that?”

“Call me what?” Gabe asked. “Oh. You mean should you call me Loki?” He paused to think about it for a moment. “No. I think you’d better stick to Gabe. It’s not that you couldn’t call me Loki, but I’d rather not announce to everyone we meet that I’m a pagan. Kinda hoped to be a bit incognito while I was over here. Pagans aren’t the most beloved entities in these parts.”

“Okay, Gabe it is,” Sam said decisively, even as he mulled over the implications of pagans being disliked in Faerie.

“And, ah, Gabe?” Sam questioned after a few more minutes of silence.

“Yeah, whatcha need now?”

“Ah… thank you,” Sam mumbled, nervously rubbing his forearm. “For stopping the witch from killing me. Both witches from killing me, really. I… I really appreciate it.”

Gabe stopped walking completely, as if being thanked was a great shock to him. Sam turned the flashlight toward him, illuminating Gabe’s features.

Gabe quickly schooled his face into a smirk and seemed to almost preen under the awkward thanks. “Sure thing. It really wouldn’t do to have a witch outfox me, after all. I’d never live it down.” But Sam got the feeling that Gabe hadn’t really been as upset as he had been about nearly being tricked.

Still, it didn’t really matter what Gabe’s motivations were. It mattered that Gabe was taking his alliance with Sam seriously and seemed to have indicated by his actions so far that Sam’s wellbeing was a priority for as long as their truce lasted.

Perhaps the limbus grass hadn’t completely worn off yet. Gabe seemed to shimmer (glow?) in Sam’s peripheral vision. That couldn’t be right. His mind must have been playing tricks on him.

* * *

Eventually, Gabe declared that they ought to rest for a little while, at least for a couple of hours until dawn. Sam may have felt better after his inadvertent drugging but it had still taken a lot out of him. He was concerned for his brother but bowed to the necessity of sleep. Even if he was less than enthused to sleep in the presence of the Trick… of Gabe. Of course, he’d twice been unconscious in Gabe’s presence and the worst that had happened was Gabe going through his things. Which, while annoying, wasn’t exactly the same as being stabbed in the night. This was comforting enough to permit Sam to doze off.

When dawn broke, they continued up the road, until it began to skirt north around the swamp, which stretched before them as far as the eye could see, all the way to the foothills of Mount Drummond. It didn’t appear to be a particularly unpleasant swamp, being more of an open marsh rather than the claustrophobic, Spanish moss infested swamps of the deep south. There were clumps of trees here and there that broke up what otherwise would have been a vast plane of marsh grass, and there was a distant forest that suggested that some areas of the swamp were creepier, but for the moment Sam thought nothing of stepping off the path and into the marshland.

The ground squelched a bit beneath his feet, but he didn’t sink too deeply into the muck. It felt more like peat beneath his feet than anything else.

Gabe followed without comment, munching on something that was probably a Milky Way.

* * *

The sky-ship docked in midair next to a truly terrifyingly tall cliff near the top of Mount Drummond. A long gangplank was dropped into place to form a bridge between the ship and the cliff, and soon the crew was disembarking with their ill-gotten catch.

Dean and Castiel followed them, staying close to Jane. They’d docked somewhat away from the official docking points and so had to walk a little ways into the small town that sat precariously on the plateau on the top of the mountain.

Jane led the way through town, skirting around all the main thoroughfares and sticking to the dark alleyways until she made it to a sketchy looking office in a squat little building tucked into a dead-end alleyway.

The man in charge of the office was apparently named Ferdy, or so the label on the door suggested, and it seemed that he was a fairly reputable trader on the black market.

Jane had her crew deposit the catch in its large insulated barrel at Ferdy’s feet, who had come out of the backroom to inspect it. He flicked open the barrel’s lightning damper and glanced at the crackling electricity within. He commented, “Yeah. Doesn’t seem very fresh. I’ll be honest.”

Dean had a hard time believing that anyone could tell how fresh magical lightning was just by looking, and further he knew that the lightning had been caught last night. It was clear that Ferdy was trying to bullshit the captain into giving him a better deal for the illicit goods. 

Jane motioned to her first mate, who handed her a curved leather vessel that also contained several bolts of lightning. “Very well, shall I give you a taste, Ferdinand, my friend?”

Ferdy shook his head uncomfortably. “No, no.” He likely did not want a large electrical discharge in his office, as it was filled with many valuable and probably illegal items. Dean had spotted several beautiful weapons, including an old-style black powder pistol and several finely wrought swords.

Jane paid Ferdy no mind and flicked open the metal valve at the end of the tube.

“Oh, there you go,” Ferdy complained, as a small bolt of lightning lashed out across the room and obliterated an expensive looking lamp, which crashed to the floor. “Brilliant. Like they’re cheap.”

“I think it’s still crackling, still alive, and très fresh,” Jane smiled dangerously at Ferdy, as if she was daring him to contradict her. “So why don’t you name your best price?”

“For ten thousand bolts?” Ferdy inquired.

“Ten thousand bolts of the very finest quality grade A lightning,” Jane confirmed.

“Yeah, but it’s difficult to shift, isn’t it? Difficult to store,” Ferdy equivocated. “If I get the Revenue men in here sniffing around, what’s the…”

Jane tapped impatiently at her sword’s hilt, and her first mate stared at Ferdy menacingly.

Ferdy stumbled over his next few words and decided, “Best price, 150 guineas.”

“Gentlemen, if you’d put the merchandise back on the _Gichigami_ and prepare to sail,” Jane commanded, and the crewmen began to reach for the lightning container.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Ferdy said, as Jane reached out to shake his hand.

“Ferdinand, it is always a pleasure doing business with you,” she stated, calmly, completely unconcerned about needing to go elsewhere to sell her haul of lightning.

“Hold on. Hold on. One minute,” Ferdy managed to stop them from leaving, at least momentarily.

“One-sixty. One-sixty,” he offered Jane for the lightning.

“I’m feeling generous today,” Jane said pointedly. “I’ll settle for no less than two-hundred.”

“Two hundred?” Ferdy was clearly displeased by this number. “Okay. You’re having a laugh. Have you had your head in that? Has the lady been sailing up where the air’s too thin?”

“You’re being very rude to me, Ferdinand,” Jane commented coldly. “Two hundred.”

“One-eighty,” Ferdy shot back.

“Two hundred,” Jane repeated.

“That’s no negotiation. I’m changing my number. One-eight-five,” Ferdy offered.

“Did I hear two-hundred?” Jane asked.

“From you, you did. Yeah,” Ferdy pointed out.

“You said two hundred,” Jane suggested, clearly attempting to trip Ferdy up.

“If I did, you’re a ventriloquist,” Ferdy shot back. “Okay, one-nine-five. Final offer.”

“One-nine-five it is,” Jane said, agreeably, reaching out to shake Ferdy’s hand. “So, of course, once we factor in sales tax, that’s, oh, two hundred.”

Ferdy’s smile disappeared, “Brilliant. Put it in the back.”

* * *

Castiel noticed that Ferdy motioned Jane off to one side as her crew went to put the lightning in the back room. With the negotiation over, Dean had wandered off to examine a collection of old-style black powder pistols. Castiel considered whether or not to go and join him.

Castiel wasn’t sure he trusted any of the humans, except for Dean with whom he felt the safest he’d been since his fall, but he didn’t want to wander too far. He didn’t fully trust that Jane was being completely honest with them. It seemed unlikely that a pirate would be, and he didn’t want to be caught unaware if Jane was like Lamia and meant to betray them.

With that in mind, Castiel followed the captain at a slight distance.

Once Ferdy felt that he was sufficiently out of earshot, as he had not noticed Castiel’s wary lurking, he asked the captain: “Have you heard any of these rumors going around about a fallen star? Everyone’s talking about it.”

Castiel froze in panic at the mention of a star. He and Dean had decided that keeping that information about Castiel to themselves was of the utmost importance, and they’d not let Jane in on anything other than the fact that Elaine would need his help to perform the spell that could break Dean’s contract. They’d hoped that that would assuage her curiosity on the topic and avoid her coming to know about Castiel’s actual species.

“You get your hands on one of them, we could shut up shop. Retire,” Ferdy continued, unaware of Castiel’s growing panic.

“Fallen star?” Jane asked in mild surprise.

“Yeah,” Ferdy confirmed.

Jane looked over her shoulder and glanced at Castiel and considered him.

Castiel felt a chill go down his spine. Did she know? Was she going to tell Ferdy?

She shook her head.

“Nothing on your travels?” Ferdy pressed hopefully.

“No.”

“Not even a little sniff of a whisper? Everyone’s going on about it down at the market?” Ferdy continued.

“Which market?” Jane asked. “Market near the wall?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, Ferdy, you’re wasting your time listening to gossip from the kind of pond scum trading down there,” Jane said, decisively.

“Well, if it…” Ferdy started to say, but was interrupted by the arrival of an elderly woman dressed in a vividly colored dress and shawl. Her hair was orange and shot through with grey and she looked tired to the bone.

“Oh, my word! Speak of the devil,” laughed Jane.

“Oh, yeah? What were you saying, then?” the woman barked.

“What a wonderful woman that you are, Sal, of course!” Jane said, joyfully. “It’s been overlong since we’ve last seen one another. I was hoping to see you about some more dresses with pockets. I damaged my favorite green one, you see…”

Ferdy clearly didn’t want to listen to the captain talk dresses with Sal, and so interrupted to compliment Sal. “You look great. You’ve had your feet done, haven’t you?”

Jane apparently was not interested in taking part in that conversation. “But, you two, you have business to attend to,” Jane said, faux regretfully. “I’ll have to see you another time about procuring a replacement for that dress of mine. Sal. Ferdy. Have a lovely day.”

This was the signal to leave, as Ferdy and Sal wandered off, with Ferdy remarking about how he’d gotten something new for Sal to see, and Sal immediately asking about what the going rate for griffin feathers were these days.

* * *

Sam and Gabe had been in the marsh for most of a day and night now, and what had started out as not terribly unpleasant had rapidly become miserable. The further into the marsh they went, the more the smell of rotting plant-life permeated the air, so much so that Sam could taste it as he breathed. The ground had become increasingly soupy and Sam could feel the water leaking into his boots, and the squelch of his socks against the leather.

Gabe spat out the chocolate he’d been mechanically chewing. “Nope. I can’t do it. That taste is somehow leeching into my chocolates. I don’t understand how. I _just_ conjured them.”

Sam smiled grimly. “I never realized that Tolkien was _understating_ how tedious cross-country quests are, and how unpleasant the outdoors can be.” He swatted at the gnats that gathered in swarms around his head.

“Ugh,” Gabe agreed. “I feel you. I can’t tell you how great it was when humans decided to invent trains and automobiles and _airplanes_. Because getting around before that was horrible.” Several mosquitos attacked Gabe’s face. “Shoo you little bastards!”

“I already hated camping before this, you know,” Sam suddenly said, surprising himself by his decision to make small-talk with an entity he knew he should be planning how to kill once their truce or alliance or whatever this was came to an end. But he found to his surprise that he wasn’t as angry with Gabe as he had been. For one, Gabe was a remarkably unoffensive travelling companion. And he had already twice saved Sam’s life.

“Oh? Not one for roughing it?” Gabe asked, managing to smash two mosquitos on his arm with one swat.

“I’ve always been hunting something when I’m in places like this. Generally something that’s hunting me back,” Sam explained, thinking back to the wendigo he and Dean had hunted when they’d been searching for their missing father. Back when everything was simple and Sam had a lot more hope for both their futures. “It takes all the fun out of it, you know?”

“Ah,” Gabe said with a nod. “You should go glamping sometime. Big fifth-wheel camper, king-sized bed with the perfect mattress. HD premium cable on a 50 inch TV. Don’t even have to look at a tree or a damn mosquito if you don’t want to.”

Sam couldn’t help but laugh at the improbable image that that put in his mind. He couldn’t even fully picture it. He and Dean camping in something that was likely furnished better than the best motel they’d ever managed to stay in. “I’m not sure how I’ll ever manage that. What with me being legally dead and only having as much money as credit card scams and low stakes poker game winnings can get you. But that sure does sound nice about now.” He slapped a mosquito. It had been filled with blood and left a smear on his wrist and his palm.

“That’s a damn shame. Everyone should go camping without actually touching nature at least once. It’s such a delightfully human invention,” Gabe said with a smile edging on mischievous.

“I guess I’ll live,” Sam shrugged as he stepped around a bit of peat that felt a little too springy.

Gabe looked over at Sam with a thoughtful expression. “I suppose I could loan a camper to you, for some R&R purposes after all this. Assuming that you trust that it’s not a trick.”

“Huh?” Sam didn’t know what to make of the offer. It sounded genuine and Gabe had come through so far as an ally. On the other hand, Gabe was Loki, a trickster god, who was only helping him because it furthered his own interests. It didn’t really make sense for him to offer to do something nice, just because. “Does it offend you that much that I’ve never gone camping in the lap of luxury?”

“Nah,” Gabe said, watching Sam closely. “Not to tread on a sore subject, but odds are good that when you get back, you’re not going to have a lot of time left with Dean. On the off-chance that you’re not going to tear the world apart to save him down to the last second, I thought you might like to spend some time with him. In a place where you won’t be breathing in that sweet moldy wallpaper smell and sleeping on sheets that don’t look like a Pollock painting under black lights.”

Sam bristled, remembering the time loop and Gabe’s insistence that Sam _needed to let Dean go_. “I’m not giving up on Dean! And when we find Castiel, Elaine’s demon contract cancelling spell will work and not involve cutting anyone’s heart out. I’m sure of it. It has to work.”

“And would that stop you?” Gabe asked softly.

Sam didn’t understand what Gabe was referring to. “What do you mean, stop me?”

“Would you stop before killing Castiel? If it came down to it. If the only way Elaine could help your brother was to cut out Castiel’s heart, would you let her do it? Would you kill Castiel for your brother?” Gabe’s questions came in rapid fire, each one tinted with harsh suspicion.

Sam nearly froze as he realized that _he wasn’t sure_ and that shook him to his core. In the time loop, he’d at least had the excuse that he’d been nearly certain that Bobby wasn’t really Bobby when he had killed him. But this time there was no excuse for uncertainty. Sam wouldn’t be killing a monster, he’d be killing an innocent star. Even though Castiel wasn’t human, it wouldn’t be any better than sacrificing a random civilian. “I-I don’t know. I don’t think… Castiel’s an innocent. I think I would object to killing him.” Sam looked at his feet, ashamed that his answer was anything other than a resounding no. “But I didn’t hesitate to kill Bobby. I mean, I was pretty sure it was a trick and that Bobby was you. But I still stabbed him in the back when I wasn’t absolutely sure. I just don’t know where I’d draw the line when it comes to saving Dean.”

“Huh,” Gabe said after what felt like an eternity of silence. “So you did learn something after all.”

“And we should stop talking about it before I want to stab you all over again,” Sam said quickly, feeling shaky and sick, thinking about the six months that had never happened, that only he and Gabe would ever remember had happened, and every amoral thing he’d done in his pursuit of the Trickster.

“Fair enough,” Gabe agreed easily enough, clicking his fingers to summon a candy bar. He held it out to Sam. “Snickers?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The dialogue between Captain Jane Morgan and Ferdy is reproduced nearly verbatim from the scene in the film in which Captain Shakespeare and Ferdy negotiate the price of lightning. I'll admit to being lazy in this regard.


	12. The Open Sky and the Marsh (Again)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean and Castiel find ways to spend their time aboard the sky-ship as they search the road below for signs of Sam.
> 
> Meanwhile, Sam and Gabe continue to pick their way toward Mount Drummond through the swamp.

Once everyone had returned to the _Gichigami_, Jane commanded her crew to make ready to sail.

She turned toward Dean and quietly whispered, “Where to?”

Dean was immediately conflicted. It would have been sensible to head toward Market, in hopes that Sam would assume that he and Castiel would be headed there as well. On the other hand, it seemed that Jane would be willing to aid him in his search for his brother. But the last place he believed his brother to have been was the very same place that the witch had been, and Dean was loath to lead civilians into danger.

“Toward Market?” Dean whispered back. “Above any roads that might lead from where you found us to Market? Maybe… maybe we might spot my brother.”

Jane nodded. “I’m sure that your brother is resourceful enough to head toward Market on his own, and that you’ll soon be reunited.”

To her crew she shouted out what their new heading was to be.

* * *

Jane invited Dean and Castiel to her quarters for dinner. She’d prepared, with the aid of the ship’s cook, a three-course meal, complete with a large roast.

Dean was thrilled to see food that was not an MRE. He ravenously fell upon the roast and the potatoes and was soon goading Cas into trying a little of everything.

Jane joined in, insisting that they each try a few of the vegetables, and introduced Cas to a certain type of orange-infused tea that she held in high regard.

Dean objected to the ridiculous tea on principle, even if it did smell wonderful, but it turned out that Cas loved it. And very quickly the captain and the star were in deep discussion of the proper amount of steeping time and the correct amount of sugar to add.

At the very least, Dean had to admit, the conversation was not unpleasant, and it was good to see Cas happy. Or at least not outright miserable.

Dean’s hopeful request for coffee was quickly shot down, as Jane informed him that he’d probably prefer not to bother with it. Not unless he enjoyed filtering the grits through his teeth. Faerie had never invented paper coffee filters.

* * *

Night was falling in the marsh and Sam was tiring out. He’d begun to stumble over roots and rocks that he’d normally have no trouble stepping over. The ground was nothing but soupy mud under his feet. It was caked half-way up his calves already. He didn’t want to consider having to sit or lay in that in order to sleep. But he needed to sleep.

Sam looked over at Gabe. For a change he wasn’t eating a candy bar, but he didn’t seem tired at all, either. Did pagan gods even require sleep? Gabe was also marginally less muddy than Sam was, but it was difficult to say if that was something to do with Gabe using magic to keep the mud off of him, or if he was just better at avoiding stumbling and the resulting splashes of mud.

“How long you gonna keep slogging through this mess tonight, kid?” Gabe inquired, having caught Sam staring at him and stumbling over a root he’d caught his foot on.

“It’s not as if there’s a dry place to bed down,” Sam complained, gesturing toward the large expanse of alternating pools of algae covered water and dark mud. “And I really don’t want to sleep in mud.”

Gabe went quiet and thoughtful. “I think I can fix that.”

Sam was instantly intrigued and looked over at Gabe hopefully.

“I’ll just need to find a reasonably flat bit of ground…” Gabe said, and began scouring the surrounding area for such a spot.

It took Gabe about ten minutes to find a suitably large patch of clear ground. He seemed to brace himself for something unpleasant before he snapped his fingers.

The patch of ground was suddenly dry beneath their feet and a small campfire was now burning at its center. Around the edges of the dry circle were tiny rune markings and Sam figured that they might have something to do with the way the mosquitoes seemed unable to bother him within the circle.

Gabe took a few steps forward and instantly sat down next to the fire, looking a little pale and breathless. Sam wasn’t sure why such a simple bit of reality bending seemed to cause Gabe so much trouble, but he didn’t really want to comment on it.

Sam sat down across from Gabe. He didn’t feel any less exhausted than he had a few minutes ago, but he wasn’t nearly as tired as he’d been during the aftermath of the encounters with each of the witches. He still had the mental acuity this time to really consider how risky it was to fall asleep in the company of a trickster.

If Gabe meant to do him harm, there would be no better time to do it than when he was fast asleep.

On the other hand, so far Gabe had been nothing but helpful. And he’d already had a few opportunities to slit Sam’s throat while he slept, or to fail to save Sam from the witches that would have finished Sam off for him.

Sam stared at Gabe warily, considering his options and how far he was truly willing to trust a trickster.

Gabe hardly looked dangerous right now. He looked exhausted. “After the effort I’ve put into getting us a dry and bug-free place to rest, you may as well sleep,” he commented, off-handedly.

Sam felt a slight twinge of concern. He didn’t think it was possible for a trickster to overextend themselves using their powers, but he didn’t very well know that for sure. And then Sam quickly berated himself for being concerned at all. He intended to kill Gabe for all those times he killed Dean, didn’t he? Getting worried about whether Gabe was going to drop dead of his own accord was ridiculous. But Sam couldn’t help but feel indebted to Gabe, too. This whole situation was all very confusing.

His compassionate side won out: “You’re okay, aren’t you?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Gabe shot back quickly, sounding more defensive than he should have been if he had nothing to hide.

“You just seem tired. I didn’t think tricksters got tired,” Sam observed, careful not to intentionally offend Gabe.

Gabe opened his mouth to retort something, but then seemed to reconsider. “Normally we don’t. Faerie just doesn’t agree with me much. I’ll be just fine. Don’t you worry about me.”

Sam wasn’t sure he entirely believed Gabe, but he didn’t think he’d get anything more out of him either. “All right. I just wanted to make sure.”

“I am!” Gabe repeated. “Or are you just trying not to fall asleep because you think I’m gonna suddenly decide that it’d be more entertaining to turn you into a toad overnight?”

“Would you?” Sam shot back.

Gabe made a show of thinking about it, before finally saying, “You’d make a terrible toad. And anyway, you’re far more fun as a human. And a good sight easier on the eyes.”

Sam groaned at the last comment and decided to admit defeat. He was exhausted and as much as he knew that he should distrust Gabe after the time loop, his intuition and all his experiences in Faerie with Gabe led him to believe that he could trust Gabe not to harm him. At least for the time being.

Sam made himself as comfortable as he could on the hard ground as the insects buzzed just outside of the circle and closed his eyes for the night.

* * *

Onboard the ship, Dean tried to make himself useful. He was deeply uncomfortable about being airborne, though, and he quickly discovered that he could not stand to be too close to the side of the ship. But as long as he was careful not to peer over the edge, he could – for the most part – make himself believe that he was on a normal ship floating on water.

Still, after the third time that Dean had frozen up when he’d gotten too close to the side of the ship, Jane appeared with two sabers, one of which she handed to Dean.

“Have you ever had occasion to practice swordplay?” she inquired.

Dean pulled the blade from its scabbard and held it as he would a machete, fully intending to pretend that he knew what he was doing.

Jane’s eyebrows shot to her hairline. “I would say not. No, no, no!”

She drew her own blade and held it out properly. “You don’t hold a sword like that! You hold it like this.”

Dean opened his mouth to be belligerent about taking criticism from a woman on how to properly fight, when he looked around and saw that the crew had stopped what they were doing and were glaring at him in warning. It was very clear that they would not stand for him backtalking to their captain.

“Sure,” Dean muttered, and adjusted his stance to match hers.

* * *

Some hours later, Dean had managed to get a good grasp on at least some of the proper forms when he was stationary, but he was still hopelessly bad at actually managing to last more than a handful of seconds against the captain when she insisted on Dean trying to use what she’d taught him.

Dean was trying not to get frustrated. He knew that if he were allowed to fight dirty, he could probably win even without the sword. But he was equally certain that the one giant of a man that was shooting him dirty looks would probably throw him overboard instantly if he were to punch Jane. So he continued, in vain, to try to do halfway decently well against her.

She knocked the sword out of his hand, again.

To Dean’s mortification, Cas had come up from below deck and been observing his dismal performance. He waited for a sarcastic remark, as Sam would have done. But there was none forthcoming from Cas.

Instead, Cas tapped the captain on the shoulder and asked, “Would it be all right if I were to give it a try?”

Dean didn’t wait for Jane’s affirmative reply before he’d shoved the hilt of the sword into Cas’s hands, in hopes that he could watch someone else get their ass handed to them for a change.

Castiel lifted the blade into precisely the correct stand and hold. Jane beamed. “It seems that your friend at least knows a little about how to handle a sword.”

Cas nodded and lunged.

The captain parried.

To Dean’s utter shock, neither the pirate captain nor the star immediately gained the upper hand. They appeared to be nearly perfectly matched. Eventually, though, Jane managed to knock Cas’s wrist hard enough to push his blade aside. While he was unable to stop her, she touched the tip of her sword to his chest.

Both were panting with exertion.

She pulled back and offered her hand to Castiel to shake.

“Well done!” she said with a bright smile. “You and I will have to spar again! Meanwhile, it seems that Mr. Winchester will require some more time and further lessons. But, I think, for today, I must attend to the rest of my work. Perhaps you could take over for me here for a while, Castiel?”

Cas frowned, “We will need another sword.”

Jane responded with a shout to her first mate, and soon another practice blade was procured for Dean to work with.

And soon Dean found himself under the tutelage of a star.

“I don’t get it,” Dean said, finally. “How do you know how to use a sword anyway?”

“Some aspects of my existence in heaven translate better to this form than others,” Cas responded cryptically.

* * *

In the depths of the marsh, Sam and Gabe were still trudging on.

Sam had been attempting to work out what Gabe’s motivations really were for helping him. He knew it had something to do with Castiel, but no matter how he looked at the situation, he couldn’t figure out why a trickster god would care about what happened to a fallen star in Faerie.

After a little while, Sam decided that all his thinking about the topic was just sending him in mental circles, and he figured that he might as well simply ask Gabe. Even if Gabe wouldn’t give him a straight answer, any answer to the question at all might give Sam a clue that would break him out of the recursive thought pattern he’d gotten himself into. “So, why do you care so much about what happens to Castiel anyway?”

“Huh?” Gabe replied, surprised by the out-of-the-blue question.

“I mean,” Sam continued, picking at his shirt sleeves, “it’s not that I’m not glad that you’re helping me out. I am. It’s just weird. Isn’t it?”

Gabe shook his head, looking very confused.

Sam realized that maybe Gabe hadn’t quite understood the question, and so clarified, “You’re a pagan god. Castiel is a star. I’m not quite understanding what the connection is. Why do you care so much about his wellbeing?”

Gabe didn’t reply immediately. In fact, he looked more than a little shifty. Sam assumed that he didn’t really want his motives being questioned.

“It’s not that I care about Castiel specifically, or anything,” Gabe finally stated in a tone of voice that Sam had never heard him use before. Gabe sounded… almost nervous? “It’s just that if that witch gets her hands on him and his heart, the Unseelie Court will get a huge power boost. I’m not saying that’s a huge problem for us pagans, but I’m not saying that that’s not a problem for us pagans, either.”

“The Unseelie Court is real?” Sam couldn’t help but ask. There was plenty of lore about fairies and the faerie courts, but he’d yet to encounter any evidence of their actual existence. He’d never met a hunter that specialized in the fae or even claimed to have personally encountered one. Of course, he was _currently in Faerie_, so perhaps he shouldn’t have been so surprised to discover that there was more to that lore than he’d previously had reason to believe.

Gabe answered this question much more readily, sounding relieved by the change of topic, “Sure it is. It’s quite the powerful political entity in Faerie, and it’s not without its power and influence in our world, too.”

The last statement only increased Sam’s curiosity, “And the pagans have dealings with it?”

“We do,” Gabe confirmed. “Not super often, because honestly they’re about as trustworthy as a swarm of piranha when there’s power to grab. But yeah, it’s not like we can just ignore them either.” Gabe paused as he rubbed the back of his neck uneasily. “It’d be politically awkward for us if they were suddenly at the peak of their power again. Honestly, I’d really like to avoid that.”

Sam nodded, turning all this new information over in his head. The revelation that the pagans and Faerie had dealings with one another wasn’t a complete shock. It made a good deal of sense, all things considered. It also made sense that the Unseelie Court (which the witches must be a part of) would be somewhat antagonistic toward most things. Ensuring that it didn’t get its hands on something as powerful as the heart of a star did seem rather important. It therefore made sense for Gabe to go to the lengths that he was going to at the moment in order to prevent a major disaster that would cause himself discomfort in the near future.

He didn’t need to care about Castiel at all to want to keep the Unseelie Court in check.

However, Sam couldn’t help but feel like Gabe _did_ care about Castiel. There was no reason for Sam to believe this, but he still felt that Gabe’s evasiveness about his motivations suggested that he was hiding something. And for whatever reason, Sam’s intuition was screaming that Gabe’s hidden motivation was concern for Castiel. He was also certain that if he pressed Gabe on this point, Gabe would refuse to talk about it any further, or would distract him with further revelations about the hidden nature of the supernatural world.

“On the other hand,” Gabe began, hesitantly, “Castiel really doesn’t deserve to be killed. And I’m all about just desserts. That fate wouldn’t be _just_. So… it’s not entirely outside of my nature to help someone who deserves my help.” Gabe regarded Sam with ancient, tired golden eyes. “I know that’s not been your experience with me, but I’m not entirely without compassion here.”

Sam recognized a genuine heart-to-heart when he heard one, and he guessed that it cost Gabe nearly as much to admit that he wasn’t heartless as it usually cost Dean to admit that he had emotions. So Sam didn’t push for more. Instead Sam grinned and let Gabe save face: “But you’re mostly here to stop the witches.”

Gabe smiled in relief, a slight glimmer appearing in his hair. “Mostly. Yes. Helping Castiel is just a really nice bonus.”

* * *

The following day was much the same as the day before aboard the sky-ship.

Jane had asked her crew to keep an eye on the roads below and to call out if any travelers were to be seen, but especially if they were to spot a lone, tall man in strange attire traveling by foot.

When they did spot someone, Dean would dare to look over the side of the ship. But it was never Sam that they’d seen.

In the meantime, the first mate – whose name was Eoin Morris - had introduced Dean to how the ship worked and how to steer her. The mechanic in Dean was entranced by the design of the flying ship, even as his fear of flying machines made it difficult to enjoy being aboard it wholeheartedly.

Jane and Castiel continued to work with him on his swordplay. He was improving, although not nearly as quickly as he would have liked. It had been a long time since Dean had last found a fighting style difficult to learn, but he was now determined to master it.

He’d also discovered that he much preferred Jane teaching him than Cas. It wasn’t because she was an easier or more lenient teacher, not at all. If anything, she was a much more demanding taskmistress. It was just that Cas made him nervous.

And it wasn’t because he was worried about Cas hurting him.

Cas was brilliant with a sword. Dean could watch him spar with the captain all day. He was just _that_ good. Not that Dean was being creepy by staring at the guy or anything.

No, Cas made him nervous because Dean was sorta embarrassed by how clumsy he was by comparison. Which was kinda weird that Jane didn’t make him feel that way. Maybe it was the way she would eventually laugh good-naturedly after she’d gotten through with a lesson and would congratulate him on what progress he had made.

Cas was far more difficult to read, and he didn’t laugh or smile as easily.

Still, it was strange how Dean’s heart would flutter a little when Cas helped him adjust his stance through the motions of a new technique.

* * *

In the evening, Dean sat and listened to Cas try to learn how to plink out a tune on Jane’s upright piano.

It wasn’t classic rock over the Impala’s radio, but it was nice to see Cas nearly grinning as the clumsy notes sprang out of the piano to form a simple tune under Jane’s tutelage.

Yet the lesson was cut short as their heading soon crossed a great thunderhead, and Jane invited them to join in on the fishing.

* * *

Dressed in black oil slickers and wearing the welding goggles that protected the lightning pirates’ eyes from damage from the brilliant flashes of light from the electricity, Dean and Cas joined the crew in wrestling the magically reinforced electrical cabling into the great insulated iron and copper barrels that stored the lightning.

Great arcs of electrical discharge flew from the copper sphere at the end of the cable to the barrel until the cable was properly fastened.

It was thrilling. Enough so to make up for the misery of becoming soaking wet and cold as the rain lashed their faces and sought every small hole in the oil slickers.

The towering thunderheads bloomed with angry light from within with each flash of lightning, and the resounding explosions of thunder were so loud and immediate that Dean could feel each one resounding in his chest.

This was nature’s fireworks. Far more impressive than any mankind could create. Untamable and all the more beautiful to witness for it.

Excited by their successful capture of yet another bolt, Dean found himself giving Cas a celebratory hug and was surprised to see Cas give him a little half grin in return. (He’d have to tell Cas how to hug back someday, as it appeared that this was something that the star did not know how to do.)


	13. Stray Not from the Road in Faerie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Gabe discover why no one has ever attempted to build a road through the marsh.
> 
> Dean learns a little about how to steer the sky-ship, while Captain Morgan offers to teach Castiel to dance.

The very type of claustrophobic swamp that Sam had not wanted to go through had emerged in their path. The trees were old and dead looking, and the moss clung to their branches. Yet it was clear that the only direct way to their destination was straight through the ugly trees. Mount Drummond rose up just beyond the trees, and Sam could just make out the road that zig-zagged to the top of it.

Sam checked his gun before entering the tree-line. It was in good working order, so far as Sam could tell without pulling it apart.

* * *

A few hours later and Sam had his nose pushed deep into his shirt collar, which he’d pulled up to try to block the worst of the smell.

“I don’t suppose that you’d be able to sense demons,” Sam commented to Gabe, who looked likewise displeased with their current location. It smelled strongly of death and rot and sulfur and it was beginning to nauseate Sam.

“Usually,” Gabe replied. “Not so sure that’s true here though. But here’s the good news: demons don’t enter Faerie unless they’ve got absolutely no other choice. It doesn’t agree with them at all. So I doubt the sulfur smell is from any of them.”

Sam acknowledged this with a quick nod, trying hard to not breathe through his nose. “It smells goddamn awful though.”

“No disagreement from me,” Gabe concurred.

The dead trees cleared out a little into a small clearing, and as Sam stepped out into it, his foot caught on something just under the mud. It pulled up a bit, out from underneath the cover of the ashen grey mud.

“What the hell?” Sam muttered as he looked down to see what he’d stumbled over. It looked a lot like bone. He leaned down and tugged on it slightly. It pulled out of the ground with a sickening sucking sound.

It was most of a ribcage and part of the spinal column.

Gabe leaned over his shoulder to see what had caught Sam’s attention. “That can’t possibly be a good sign,” he muttered to Sam. “We should probably keep moving and get the hell out of here.”

A thunderous crash of a tree coming down nearby caused them both to jump.

Sam pulled his gun and began scanning their surroundings for the source of the noise as he began to shuffle in the general direction they’d been headed in all day. They were close to the mountain and they’d already begun to push into its foothills. Even though the swamp had not yet given way to drier ecology despite the way that the elevation had began to increase, Sam knew there couldn’t be very much of it left to push through. Surely their best choice would be to keep heading toward their destination.

Another tree crashed down. It sounded even closer than the first. Sam hurried, hoping to cross the clearing into the relative safety of the dense trees on the other side before whatever was moving toward them reached them. He wasn’t sure he wanted to meet whatever it was.

The source of the sound appeared without any further warning. A bone-white head the size of a small VW Beetle poked its way into the clearing. It moved in swaying motions on a low-slung body, propped up on two wickedly clawed limbs.

“A lindorm,” Gabe identified the wingless dragon-like beast immediately, hissing the word at Sam lowly, fearful of being overheard by the creature. He yanked Sam to hide behind the nearest half-shattered tree stump.

The lindorm lifted its massive head and scented the air with its tongue. Somehow it had not yet spotted them. Its jaws were covered in dripping saliva and it dragged itself forward on two forelimbs as the rest of its mass slithered along like a serpent. Spines jutted like frills around its skull and continued down its back to its tail. A sticky residue dripped from its scales and coated everything it brushed up against.

Sam sat down out of sight as the massive creature continued to drag and slither itself closer and closer to their hiding place. He glanced over at Gabe, in hopes that the trickster would have a plan or the ability to snap his fingers and do something about the monstrosity that was searching for the trespassers in its domain.

Gabe didn’t look confident, though. Not at all. In fact, he looked a little frantic. Panicked.

“What do we do?” Sam whispered, keeping his voice as quiet as possible so as to not alert the lindorm to their presence.

Gabe shot him a sharp look. “Try not to be noticed. Lindorms are highly magic resistant. If I try to smite it, all I’m going to do is end up in its gullet.”

The lindorm lurched closer. Sam pressed his back as tightly to the tree stump as he could, hoping to be as invisible as he could be for a man of his size.

Gabe suddenly tackled him to one side, just as the lindorm’s massive tail and spikes splintered the remnants of the tree they’d been hiding behind.

It lunged toward them with deceptive speed for a creature of its size, maw gaping wide.

Sam shot at it, emptying his entire clip into its skull, but this may as well have been mosquito bites for all that it reacted to it. It did turn away in annoyance, but it was otherwise unharmed by Sam’s bullets.

“Move!” Gabe shouted, and Sam obeyed. He doubted very much that they could outrun such a gigantic creature, but Sam was also at a loss as for what could possibly kill it. He knew now that his gun was useless, even if he could find where he’d shoved his extra clips.

As he charged through the tangle of fallen trees – and the remains of the lindorm’s victims – Sam rummaged for his machete. It seemed terribly unlikely to be of any use, but it also seemed like the closest thing he had to the traditional dragon-slaying equipment of a sword.

“Duck!” yelped Gabe, just as the lindorm’s tail lashed above them, lodging foot-long spines into a nearby tree which only barely withstood the assault.

The duffel flew, landing just out of Sam’s reach, the machete luckily gripped in his hand. Sam darted left. Gabe went right.

The lindorm was briefly distracted by its caught tail, twisting and turning as it tried to free its spines from the stubborn wood.

Sam found shelter for the moment behind a thick tangle of fallen trees and fought to catch his breath.

The lindorm ripped itself free and lunged away from where Sam was hidden

He cautiously peered out his hiding place to realize that the lindorm may have lost track of him but had clearly followed Gabe.

Sam briefly considered fleeing and leaving Gabe to fend for himself. Gabe was a trickster, both resourceful and powerful. Surely he’d be fine?

“Damn it,” Sam muttered, realizing that he didn’t have it in him to leave Gabe to deal with the lindorm alone.

Gabe was not faring exactly poorly, but he certainly wasn’t in good shape either. He was doing a valiant job of avoiding the lindorm’s jaws and talons, but it was clear that his luck would run out sooner or later.

Sam scanned the area and realized that the lindorm was currently in the bottom of a small gulley. The ridge that rose above the gulley was tall enough that it extended well above the lindorm’s head. Not so much so that the creature couldn’t strike at someone standing there, but certainly enough that someone might be able to attack it from above.

If Sam could move quickly and quietly enough, he could get above it. He wasn’t one-hundred percent sure of what his plan was after that, but he was hoping that perhaps the back of its neck was not as heavily armored as its skull.

As Sam ran along the top of the ridge, he watched as Gabe managed the improbable feat of dodging the lindorm’s talons as he lunged at the lindorm’s head, stabbing it in the eye, and blinding it on its right side. Conveniently, this left the monster with a blind spot on the very same side from which Sam was approaching.

But even as Gabe’s knife went through the lindorm’s eye, it thrashed its massive head in pain, catching Gabe with the side of its jaw. Gabe was sent tumbling through the air and struck one of the splintered tree trunks.

To Sam’s horror, Gabe did not get back up immediately, and the lindorm was already beginning to recover from the loss of its eye.

Out of time and with few options, Sam jumped down off the ridge and landed on the lindorm’s neck. It didn’t even seem to register his added weight, so intent was it on the dazed (possibly injured) trickster that had hurt it.

Sam stabbed downward as hard as he could with the machete, trying to push the blade between the vertebrae of the creature’s spine. The creature’s skin was tough and thick and did not cut easily.

The lindorm’s jaws opened wide as it loomed over Gabe intent on gobbling him in a single bite.

Sam dislodged the blade, surprised that the lindorm had not yet tried to shake him free and drove the machete down again.

This time the blade sank deeply into the lindorm’s flesh and Sam sawed on it as much as possible to maximize the damage he was doing to the creature’s spine.

The lindorm shuddered, a full-body spasm, and then collapsed. Sam was nearly unseated as the massive corpse crumpled, but by luck and a good handhold on the deeply embedded machete, he held on and avoided being crushed underneath the creature’s body.

Sam slipped free of the foul-smelling corpse after he dislodged his machete.

“Gabe?” he called and was surprised and very worried when he received no reply.

He hurried around the lindorm’s head to look for his trickster ally.

Gabe was still limply propped up by the tree that the lindorm’s thrashing had thrown him into. He looked unconscious, his head hanging down onto his chest and his golden hair obscuring his face. Sam had never seen Gabe unconscious or even asleep, and Sam couldn’t help but fear that this meant something terrible.

He lurched into an uneven run to kneel at Gabe’s side.

A ragged two-by-four sized chunk of grey and slimy wood – a splinter from the tree Gabe had landed on – had impaled Gabe’s shoulder.

It was high enough and off-center enough that Sam was confident that it hadn’t pierced Gabe’s heart, but he feared that it had punctured Gabe’s lung. He wasn’t sure if that would be enough to kill Gabe, especially since the stake wasn’t covered in his victim’s blood. But the wood was covered in the slime that the lindorm seemed to excrete, and what Sam had gotten onto his skin felt mildly caustic. What if the lindorm’s slime was harmful to pagan gods?

There was no way for Sam to know without Gabe telling him.

Sam reached out and gently took Gabe’s face in his hands.

Gabe was still breathing and moaned when Sam touched him.

“Gabe!” Sam exclaimed. “Gabe! Wake up!”

“Wha’?” Gabe groaned, trying to move and crying out in pain when his efforts only served to jostle the injury to his shoulder. He blindly grasped at Sam’s arm with the hand that wasn’t paralyzed by the damage done to his shoulder.

“Don’t move,” Sam commanded. “I need you to tell me what to do here. You’ve got a big chunk of wood stuck in your shoulder. I can’t move you with it in. But I need to know if it’s safe to remove it.”

Gabe was still disoriented but managed to turn his head to get a glimpse of the massive splinter that was impaling him and pinning him to the tree.

After several tense moments where Sam worried that Gabe wouldn’t be lucid enough to make a decision or, worse, would pass back out, Gabe finally slurred: “Taker out. Won’t kill me.”

Sam felt a little wretched. He didn’t actually want to cause Gabe pain and there was no way to help except to cut the splinter free of the tree and then pull it from Gabe’s shoulder. Doing so would certainly jar Gabe’s shoulder and cause him more pain. But it was the only way to remove the splinter.

“Gabe, I need to cut the splinter off of the tree trunk. It’s going to hurt,” Sam informed him, as calmly as he could manage.

“Okay,” Gabe murmured, closing his eyes and bracing for the pain.

Sam moved quickly, hacking the splinter free with the machete with a resounding crack.

Gabe groaned as the splinter twisted in his shoulder.

“Sorry, sorry,” Sam muttered, feeling a little awful, but gripping the splinter firmly in order to pull it out of Gabe’s shoulder.

“Get on with it,” Gabe complained through gritted teeth.

Sam pulled it out. It came free slowly as Gabe flinched and shuddered in pain, but it did come free. Sam tore the least dirty part of his shirt off to bandage it as best he could.

Having done what little first aid he could under the circumstances, Sam decided to try to find his lost duffel, which had contained some medical supplies.

Searching turned up nothing and Sam was forced to conclude that it must have been smashed into the mud by the lindorm as it attempted to kill and eat them.

Sam returned to Gabe and helped him to his feet. The only thing to do was to get out of this godforsaken swamp and seek help at the town at the top of the mountain.

* * *

It had taken hours to coax and half carry Gabe up the side of the mountain. Gabe had faded in and out of consciousness. When he was lucid, he was belligerent about Sam supporting him as they walked, but he rarely made it more than a handful of steps before he’d almost fall as he nearly passed out from shock and blood loss. Or so Sam guessed. He didn’t know if tricksters could even suffer from shock and blood loss. On the other hand, perhaps this was some kind of poison from either the slime that the wood splinter had been covered in, or simply from being stabbed by something so close to the very thing known to be able to kill tricksters.

By the time they made it to the top of the mountain, Gabe could hardly be said to be conscious at all. Sam nearly asked the first person they met to direct them to a physician, before he recalled that Gabe had said that pagan gods were not well regarded in Faerie. Sam doubted that he could trust a physician with Gabe’s true nature, and he doubted that a physician could do more for him than Sam could with a medkit without needing Sam to disclose Gabe’s species. With that in mind, he looked for the least sketchy looking inn that would also probably not ask too many questions about their muddy and bloodstained clothes.

When Sam located a promising option, it took quite some time and more money than he’d intended to part with to convince the innkeeper to give them a decent room.

Once he got Gabe into the room, he managed to haul him onto the bed and made him as comfortable as he could. At a loss for what else to do, he left in hopes of finding medical supplies at one of the town’s shops. Fortunately, the town had plenty of stores that sold all manner of goods, and in one he found some medical supplies to replace those he’d lost with the first aid kit.

Gabe didn’t wake as Sam cleaned the wound as best he could and stitched up the damage. Having accomplished that much, there wasn’t much more that Sam could do but wait and hope that Gabe would recover.

* * *

Evening was falling aboard the _Gichigami_ and the Mr. Morris had permitted Dean to take the helm. With the Mr. Morris hovering over his shoulder and giving off enough nervous energy to furnish the entire city of New York with anxiety for a week.

On the deck below one of the crew, a burly looking dude, had produced a dulcimer from somewhere below decks and had set it up to practice. Before very long, he was plinking out a surprisingly pleasant tune on it.

Cas had come up on deck as well and was now swaying to the music, as if he wanted to dance to it but either had no idea how to go about dancing or was too embarrassed to try it.

Jane noticed though and approached Cas, startling him when she placed a hand on his shoulder to get his attention. “Would you like to dance?”

“I don’t know how,” Cas replied simply.

“Well, then, would you like to learn?” Jane inquired holding out her hand to him.

Cas looked slightly panicked at Jane’s outstretched hand.

Dean felt an odd stab of jealousy. Although he didn’t understand what he could be possibly be jealous of. He couldn’t teach Cas how to dance, even if he wanted to, because he was only barely passable at it himself. (He did know how, because there had been this woman in Arizona that he’d spent a week with who was a professional ballroom dancer. It had been a good week.)

“I don’t know…” Cas equivocated.

“I’d love to show you,” Jane replied, her sillier side beginning to shine through her expression. “It’s so much fun to dance! You should at least give it a try.”

Dean watched from the helm as Jane tried to teach Cas how to take the lead at the waltz, but after several failed attempts that ended with Jane grimacing as Cas stepped on her toes, she asked if he’d prefer if she took the lead. Cas was quick to agree, and soon Dean found himself watching Cas and Jane dance a stumbling gender-swapped waltz. A very poor example of one.

Cas might be confident and graceful with a sword, but he was anything but that while dancing. He stumbled and staggered and stomped Jane’s feet almost constantly. But he was a quick study and improved relatively quickly. Enough so that Jane eventually convinced him to try taking the lead again. (It didn’t last very long, but had Jane howling with laughter.)

They practiced at it until the dulcimer player apologized for getting tired and being unable to provide musical accompaniment anymore. Fortunately, Cas had _almost_ managed to figure out how the waltz worked by that point.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The illustration of the lindorm is my own work.
> 
> Also, at long last, I begin to move the plot forward again.


	14. The Agate and the Dance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Portown, Sam searches for a way to treat Gabe's injury while also inquiring about his brother's whereabouts.
> 
> Aboard the sky-ship, Dean discovers he's vastly improved his skill at swordplay during his time on the ship and the pirate crew have an hold an impromptu dance in the evening.

Gabe had still not woken by the next morning, and Sam was truly beginning to worry that Gabe was in real trouble. He’d broken out into a feverish sweat, which struck Sam as a very bad sign.

Unsure of what else to do, Sam decided to ask the innkeeper where he might find a physician to consult. He didn’t intend to bring Gabe to the physician or the physician to Gabe. After the encounters with the witches and the overwhelming feeling of paranoia that Sam had that there were yet more hostile forces in Faerie, he didn’t trust anyone. And he certainly wasn’t going to risk it with Gabe seemingly being so vulnerable.

Nonetheless, he hoped that a physician might know something useful about the type of injury Gabe had received and what, if anything, could be done to help him.

The innkeeper had pointed him to a reputable physician and then mentioned in hushed tones that this one tended to not ask too many awkward questions. Sam wasn’t sure how he felt about the fact that the innkeeper seemed to immediately assume that he was up to something illicit, but he was glad for the advice all the same.

The physician took a little while to get to Sam once he found his way to his office, which made Sam uneasy, because the longer he was away from Gabe the more Sam worried that he’d return to find a dead trickster.

“What is the trouble, sir?” the physician asked once he’d ushered Sam into his examination room, while giving Sam’s mud and gore covered clothing a clinical once over. It was obvious that he assumed that Sam was injured and required care.

“I’m all right,” Sam corrected this assumption. “It’s… I have a question. About how to treat a certain kind of injury.”

The physician took a seat and motioned for Sam to do the same. Sam found that he had too much nervous energy to sit, so instead paced back and forth while fidgeting with the agate around his neck.

“Perhaps I can help with that,” the physician stated patiently.

“Ah… what do you know about lindorm slime?” Sam queried.

“It’s caustic for a start,” the physician replied, “but that’s not particularly harmful if you wash it off in a reasonably timely manner and don’t ingest it. If you didn’t wash it off, I’d suggest standard burn care.”

“Uh…” Sam felt uneasy about revealing even this much. “What if the slime was introduced to a deep wound?”

The physician frowned and looked uneasy himself, probably concerned with how Sam had come into contact with lindorm slime in the first place and very concerned about the notion of lindorm slime _and_ deep wounds. “It’s a fairly potent poison. But luckily there is an antidote and a salve for the wound that will encourage it to heal.”

Sam held in the sigh of relief at hearing the news that there was a treatment for Gabe’s wound. “And can I purchase some from you? Or do I need a prescription for the apothecary? How does this work?”

The physician seemed rather surprised by this request. It took Sam a moment to realize that he might have thought that Sam was some kind of assassin given the state of his clothing, rather than assuming that he’d had a run-in with a lindorm and lived to tell the tale.

“Of course,” the physician replied. “I have the salve here, but I’ll have to write up a formulation of the antidote for the apothecarist to fill. You’ll need to go up the street four doors to find her.” He got up and went to fetch the salve.

When he returned, he wrote out the directions for the salve (which was to apply topically to the wound and apply clean bandages twice daily until the wound was healed). He handed Sam another page with the formula for the antidote, and then ushered him out the door.

The apothecarist down the street was a very pleasant middle-aged woman who chattered away at Sam as she worked on mixing up the antidote. She suggested that there was a nice clothing shop down the way if he needed to buy some new clothes for the road. “My niece works there. Lovely girl.”

When she finished with the antidote, she became quite stern as she explained that it needed to be administered orally and to be sure to take _all_ of it.

* * *

Upon returning to the inn and Gabe, Sam worked quickly to prepare the antidote for administration. He’d gotten the impression that the antidote was best delivered as soon as possible after exposure to the poison and he was worried that Gabe had already been nearly twenty-four hours without it. He knew that Gabe was likely in poor shape. Not to mention that it concerned Sam that Gabe hadn’t been able to eat anything sugary in that amount of time or longer. Tricksters were said to get weaker and weaker the longer that they went without their sugary fuel.

Getting Gabe to drink the antidote down was a challenge, but somehow Sam managed to coax Gabe into waking for just long enough to get it down.

By comparison the salve was much easier to apply, especially since Sam had taken the opportunity to buy some actual bandages to use on the wound.

Having done this, Sam knew that there was nothing more he could do but wait for the antidote to take effect. (He hoped that Gabe being a pagan would not change the effectiveness of the antidote, but he’d already felt that he’d gambled an awful lot in trusting the physician with the implication that he’d been attacked by a lindorm.)

* * *

An hour or so later, Gabe’s fever had broken and he’d woken. He clearly wasn’t feeling very well, but when Sam pressed him about how he was doing and if he needed some sugar, Gabe had groaned and swore at his still injured shoulder before eventually assuring Sam that he was going to be all right, but that he just wanted to be left alone to sleep until his head stopped pounding.

Sam pushed on the topic of sugar, knowing that Gabe _must_ need some, regardless of whether or not the antidote had left him nauseated.

Gabe eventually relented, agreeing to have some of the sugar water that Sam had managed to procure, and then insisted that Sam leave him be for a little while.

* * *

With Gabe recuperating on his own, Sam had been pushed out of the inn for the next few hours. Lacking any other ideas for how to spend his time, he decided to take the apothecarist’s advice and visit the clothing shop. It seemed wise that now that the worst of the crisis was over, it was probably time to try to buy some clean clothing that wouldn’t make people think he was either a vagrant or an assassin.

The clothing shop was easy to find, and it was staffed by three young women who apparently found him very handsome despite his mud and gore covered clothes, and so were only too delighted to help him find some reasonable replacements for the clothes that the swamp had destroyed. (He was also certain that they cut him a considerable discount in hopes that he might “call on them again _whenever_ he might want to. Day _or_ night.”)

Feeling much better after he’d changed into clean clothing and deciding that he was much less likely to be mistaken as a murderer, Sam decided to kill a little more time by trying to find out if anyone in town had seen either Dean or Castiel.

Unfortunately, his inquiries about two men travelling together, both tall, one with dark hair and blue eyes and wearing a large clear gemstone around his neck on a golden chain, and the other with very dark blonde hair and green eyes, in very strange attire, were mostly met with confusion or regret that they could not help him as they had not seen any such individuals.

Eventually, though, his persistence was rewarded when he encountered a gentleman that recalled seeing two such individuals that vaguely resembled what Sam had described, although neither had been in odd attire and they weren’t travelling alone. He directed Sam to try asking around the seedier side of town and the alleyway he thought he’d seen the whole group sneaking down.

Sam had thanked the man profusely, even if this lead was a thin one.

And this was how Sam found himself speaking with a very unpleasant man by the name of Ferdy.

Ferdy seemed to have a faulty memory that needed the help of gold coins to jog it. But once Sam had relinquished two such coins, Ferdy recalled that he had seen two men that closely matched Sam’s description among the crew that had accompanied the lightning pirate Captain Jane Austen Morgan.

“Bloody fierce pirate she is, too,” Ferdy had commented amid his more inane chattering. “Not sure that I’d want to get mixed up in her business. I mean, great business partner! Couldn’t convince me to step aboard her ship. I like having all my appendages, thank you very much!”

“And you’re sure that the one with dark hair had a big diamond around his neck?” Sam repeated, thinking that this was probably the feature most likely to stand out about Castiel in someone like Ferdy’s mind.

“Yep!” Ferdy confirmed. “And he had a green-eyed fellow with him. About the right height and build. It seems likely that they’re the two you’re looking for.”

Sam bit his lip. This didn’t sound great. It seemed that Dean and Castiel had somehow managed to get into far more trouble than he’d assumed. Although it did appear that they weren’t in immediate danger of witches.

“And which way did you say that the sky ship set sail in?” Sam asked, worried more than ever about his brother.

“Toward the east, I’d say,” Ferdy replied.

Sam looked around the shop / office while he considered what else he might need to ask. It was cluttered with items of every description, many of which Sam suspected where probably cursed or of otherwise dubious providence. “I don’t suppose that you sell runes carved into a dragon’s knuckles?” Sam asked, hopeful that he’d be able to lay his hands on the best way to track Dean and Castiel while he was here.

Ferdy shook his head and then began to suggest all manner of other items that he thought Sam may have an interest in and that he _did_ have in stock. Since Sam didn’t recognize even a third of the items Ferdy was talking about, he wasn’t interested in whatever Ferdy was trying to sell.

Instead, Sam gave Ferdy his polite FBI smile and handed over the final agreed upon gold piece, not bothering to listen to any more of Ferdy’s chattering.

The important thing to know was that Dean and Castiel appeared to be headed toward Market. Probably. That was the good news. The bad news being that they may or may not be captives of a dangerous lightning pirate.

* * *

By the time Sam had returned to the inn, Gabe was up and around.

He’d somehow cleaned and repaired his clothes, although Sam could still see that his shoulder was bandaged and that he was holding his arm very stiffly to avoid jostling his shoulder. Clearly he wasn’t healing as rapidly as he would normally. (Sam assumed. He wasn’t certain that they’d ever so much as put on a scratch on Gabe actually, rather than one of his many illusions.)

Sam considered telling Gabe that a sling would help a lot with supporting his injured shoulder, but he also had the feeling that suggesting a sling would have Gabe getting all prickly again. Gabe very clearly did not like feeling vulnerable and wearing something that announced his injury so clearly would likely upset him.

“You’re back,” Gabe observed sitting down on the bed as Sam closed the door to the room behind him. “And with new clothes.” Gabe gave him an appraising look that made Sam feel oddly self-conscious.

Sam shrugged, “I wasn’t sure how long you’d need to rest before you could clean and repair the old ones, so I figured I’d do a little shopping on Elaine’s dime.”

“Color me surprised,” Gabe continued, “I would have thought for sure you’d be asking everyone and their brother if they’d seen Dean.”

“You’re jumping the gun a little bit there,” Sam replied with a smile. “After I got some less suspiciously gore covered clothing, I _did_ ask around to see if anyone had seen two men that looked like Dean and Castiel.”

Gabe leaned forward and motioned for Sam to continue. “Well?”

“They _were_ here. A fellow that fences stolen and illegal goods saw them come through town. And he saw the direction they left in too. That’s the good news,” Sam stated.

“I take it that there’s some bad news to go with that good news,” Gabe muttered tiredly.

“They were spotted among the crew of a sky ship that is captained by a very fierce lady pirate. He claimed that they didn’t look distressed, but I can’t imagine that their being stuck aboard a ship with a bunch of pirates is a good thing,” Sam said, taking a seat on the other bed.

“No, I’d imagine not,” Gabe agreed, suddenly looking very old.

“I also did not have any luck in locating either a Babylon candle or knucklebone runes,” Sam reported, deciding to get the other bit of bad news out of the way.

“Raspberries!” Gabe snapped like a curse. “It was going to be enough trouble to track them if they were travelling by land. It’ll be damn near impossible to track them if they’re airborne.”

Sam went to remind Gabe that the black-market dealer had seen the direction that the ship had gone off in, but Gabe wasn’t done speaking yet.

“Honestly, if only Castiel hadn’t warded himself. Or Dean had something distinct from our world to track,” Gabe complained. “But Castiel did. And Dean doesn’t.”

Sam’s mouth snapped shut as he realized that Dean _did_ have something very unique that Gabe might be able to track, and even more useful than just that knowledge… Sam had its twin hanging from a leather cord around his neck.

“Wait a moment!” Sam exclaimed, digging in his shirt’s collar for the agate charm’s leather cord. He pulled the agate free of his shirt and dangled it away from himself, the cord tugging against the nape of his neck. “Is this distinctive enough? Because Dean has one exactly like it.”

Gabe got up and approached Sam, very cautiously, like he wasn’t sure that he was allowed to get so near Sam when there wasn’t a crisis unfolding.

For Sam’s part, he found that he wasn’t the least bit frightened of Gabe anymore. After how upsetting nearly watching the lindorm kill him had been, Sam had accepted that he didn’t want Gabe dead and even liked him a little. He was funny and clever and a good ally to have. (A tiny part of Sam was even beginning to hope that they might become friends.)

Gabe examined the agate with a critical eye. “Where did you ever come by this?”

“Elaine enchanted them for me and Dean, before she sent us across the Wall to find Castiel,” Sam explained. “I hadn’t thought about it for a while, but it is from our world. Can you use it to track Dean?”

“Do you mind if I…?” Gabe held out his hand, indicating that he wanted Sam to hand him the agate.

“Sure!” Sam replied, hurriedly pulling the cord over his head and extending the dangling agate toward Gabe.

Gabe seemed surprised at Sam’s willingness to hand over the agate so quickly and easily. Sam dropped it into the palm of Gabe’s outstretched hand.

Gabe looked from the agate to Sam a couple of times, as if to assure himself that Sam had actually given it to him without protest. It took him a moment to prod the stone with his fingers, and Sam observed a tiny glimmer of blue light spark into being in Gabe’s pupils as he did so. The agate glowed warmly in response to whatever Gabe had done.

Gabe smiled victoriously. “This will work. With the right spell, this agate, and that map of yours, I can track them. Not _extremely_ precisely, but enough to get us within a mile or two of them.”

Sam smiled right back, thrilled to finally have some properly good news. “That’s great! I’ll go and see if I can find where I put the map. I’m pretty sure I put it in the pocket of my old overcoat.”

“Sam, do you know what this charm does?” Gabe asked, his tone very strange.

Sam paused in his rummaging through his muddy coat’s pockets. “Elaine said something about… protection? I’m not sure what kind, but obviously I haven’t seen it doing me a lot of good so far.” He glanced back at Gabe.

Gabe was holding the agate like it was the Hope Diamond. “It’s protection, all right. Seriously powerful protection at that. Not the sort that’ll stop you from ingesting toxic plant-life, like limbus grass, or keep a lindorm from munching on you. But what it will do, is prevent any magic from being used on you without your explicit consent. Possibly with the exception of the magic in question is very benign or universally beneficial, but I can’t be sure.”

Sam felt a very faint twinge of anxiety. Had he misread his situation? Was the reason Gabe had been so harmless thus far because the agate had prevented him from doing anything to Sam?

Gabe crossed the room and went to hand the agate back to him. “You should keep that on you at all times, except when we’re using it to track Dean.”

Sam looked at the agate and back at Gabe, but he didn’t take it. Gabe offering to return it alone was enough to assuage Sam’s doubts. “Yeah. You’re probably right. But weren’t we going to do that now?”

“Ah, yes, I suppose we could,” Gabe agreed, eyeing the map that Sam was laying out on a table.

Once the map was flattened out and Sam had weighted down the edges, Gabe dangled the agate over it like a dowsing pendulum, and murmured something with a lot of hard, choppy syllables. That tiny pinprick of blue light appeared for just a moment in his pupils, and then the agate swayed wildly before dragging itself east of the marking for Mount Drummond, settling down to hover over a point above the road to Market.

“And there we have it,” Gabe announced. “Provided that Dean is still in possession of his charm, he and Castiel are somewhere near the road to Market, about ninety miles away.”

Sam made a tiny, careful pencil mark on the map, with a little “#1”, so they didn’t have to repeat the spell every time they forgot where it had said Dean and Castiel were.

Gabe sat the agate on the table next to Sam’s left hand.

“Ah…” Gabe started, hesitantly. “You do realize that I really can’t do anything to you while you’re wearing that, right? Without your permission, that is.”

Sam nodded, “I had gathered that from what you said earlier.”

“You’d have probably been safe from the witch fire, too,” Gabe added.

Sam looked up from the map. Gabe was watching him curiously, as if he was trying to figure some difficult puzzle out.

“I figured if I can trust you to not slit my throat while I was sleeping in that godforsaken swamp, I can probably trust you to resist the urge to turn me into a beetle while I don’t have it on for a few minutes,” Sam stated honestly, picking up the agate and slipping it back over his head.

Gabe looked shocked at this, but he recovered quickly to grin that patently Gabe-mischievous smile at the same time a very faint silvery shimmer appeared around his head.

“Shall we go get some supplies and be on our way?” Gabe asked, grin never leaving his face.

* * *

Several uneventful days had passed aboard the _Gichigami_. There was still no sign of Sam on the road below, but Dean suspected that perhaps they’d gotten ahead of him and that they’d meet one another in Market.

Dean hefted a practice blade and squared off against Jane. Cas was watching from nearby.

Jane lunged. Dean parried. His movements were a lot more fluid than they’d been only a few days earlier, and he felt that he was keeping up well with Jane’s attacks. He even found that it was possible for him to counterattack.

Still, it came as a surprise when he found himself disarming her on technical merit alone. He had been sure that she hadn’t been going _that_ easy on him.

She beamed in happiness at his improvement.

Dean found his eyes drawn to Cas. Cas had that slight smile that was more visible around his eyes than his mouth.

Dean smiled back, feeling that odd little flutter in his heart again.

Before he could think about what that might _mean_, Jane clapped him on his back and interrupted the strange little moment.

* * *

In the evening, the ship lit up with tiny witch lights as a trio of musicians got out their instruments and began to play.

Soon the rest of the crew had paired off and begun to dance to the music.

Jane and Castiel were dancing. He had taken further lessons with her when she had found time for it and was now somewhat competent in both taking the lead, as well as following, although he still tended to occasionally stomp on Jane’s feet.

A visible glow shimmered into being around his head as he danced, bright enough that it was unmistakable for anything else. He was smiling that small smile that meant he was enjoying himself.

Jane leaned in as they twirled in a slow, careful circle and whispered into his ear, “I know what you are.”

Castiel’s glow cut out immediately as he stiffened in fright at what might very well be a threat.

“Don’t worry,” Jane continued to whisper. “No one aboard my ship will harm you. You’re perfectly safe. And if anyone gets any funny ideas, I’ll cut _their_ heart out. With a spoon.”

“That would be difficult,” Castiel immediately replied, relaxing at her protective declaration, but also completely befuddled as to why she would use a spoon when a knife or a sword would be much more efficient.

She chuckled at that, and then grew serious again. “Your emotions give you away. You’ll need to learn how to control them. You’ve been glowing a little brighter each day, you know?” She glanced toward Dean, who was lazing on a stack of coiled rope. “I think I know why.”

“Of course I know why I am glowing, I _am_ a star,” Castiel defended himself. “It’s what we do best.”

Jane smiled, before cringing slightly as Castiel stepped on her foot. “Well that’s good, as stars certainly do not waltz that well.”

* * *

Dean had gotten up and decided to join the fun. He crossed the deck and tapped Jane on her shoulder, meaning to cut in and dance with their host for a while. To his surprise, the captain stepped away and gave Cas a gentle shove toward Dean, as she spun away to dance with her first mate.

Dean froze in surprise at having a sudden armful of male-shaped star, but then relaxed slightly as he realized that there were several same-sex dance partners scattered across the deck. Most of whom he was quite sure were just close friends, although the one set of women Dean was equally sure were _together_ together.

Cas seemed to wait patiently for Dean to come to a decision.

“I only know how to lead,” Dean finally admitted, deciding not to overthink this and to just enjoy himself.

Cas adjusted his stance accordingly, placing one hand on Dean’s shoulder and fitting the other into Dean’s hand, as Dean gingerly placed his free hand on Cas’s waist.

There was that fluttering feeling again in Dean’s chest that he was trying so studiously to ignore, even as he found himself taking note of how vividly blue Cas’s eyes were.

And Cas had that crinkly smile to his eyes as they awkwardly tried not to step on one another’s feet. And was he glowing a bit? Dean had noticed that sometimes Cas looked like he was shimmering or glowing a little, but this was much more pronounced than it normally was. Then again, Cas was a fallen star. Perhaps a bit of random glittery-ness was normal for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When WarlockWriter originally read the previous chapter and this one, he requested more hurt/comfort than I wrote here. Although this is still the original version (with my corrections for my original errors in grammar and spelling), the expanded scene does exist on my hard-drive. Given that I liked my story as it was without that scene, I didn't try to integrate it here, but I'd likely be easily persuaded to either integrate it into this story as an additional chapter between the current Chapters 13 and 14, or perhaps as a time-stamp. (However, at this time it likely needs some clean up and additional proof-reading to assure myself that I didn't contradict anything written in the main story. Thus, for now, it remains on my hard-drive.)


	15. Questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Gabe continue to follow Dean and Castiel's path toward the Market and Wall, and Sam begins to suspect that Gabe may not be precisely what he claimed to be.
> 
> Meanwhile, Dean can no longer delay returning to the human world so he and Castiel part ways with the captain and crew of the sky-ship.

Sam and Gabe had been on the road headed toward Market for several days.

Compared to their trek through the swamp, travelling by road was a far nicer experience. It was dry for a start, and once Gabe had recovered from the wound on his shoulder, he could simply snap them both clean. With Sam’s permission, of course. But that processs had taken a few days of endless complaints about how slowly his shoulder was healing, though, and reminders by Sam that he ought to keep reapplying that salve, just in case.

What was surprising was that they appeared to be gaining on the sky-ship that they presumed Dean and Castiel were still aboard. Based on their twice-daily tracking spell, the ship had been zig-zagging back and forth over the road as it drifted slowly toward Market. It occasionally diverged from that pattern to seek out a thunderstorm. 

Today, however, it appeared to be en route to a large lake, the closest such body of water to Market. Gabe had suggested that the ship might be intending to touch down there, perhaps with the intention of offloading cargo for Market, and he also thought that they might be able to make it there by tomorrow if they hurried.

In the meantime, there wasn’t a lot to do but walk and walk. This time, Sam had been making an effort to invite conversation, and Gabe had seemed to be more than happy to fill what would have otherwise been silent travel with stories and unpredictable rants about monsters of every variety. Sam often wished he could write down all that he heard, because Gabe appeared to be extraordinarily knowledgeable about monsters. And the stories he told about the Norse gods were often equal parts hilarious while also being completely lost to human history.

During all this time that they’d been on the road since leaving Portown, Sam had been paying extra attention to Gabe that he hadn’t before. Initially it had been out of concern for Gabe and his injury, but during that time Sam couldn’t help but notice a few things.

For one, Gabe didn’t snap up candy nearly as often as he used to. Sam had been worried that he wasn’t able to while he was hurt and that without it, he might worsen. However, Gabe had still healed far faster than any human would have from the same amount of trauma and had recently gone back to snapping up the odd piece of candy now that he felt better.

The reasonable explanation for this was that the injury had made Gabe lose his appetite. Sometimes that happened when you didn’t feel well, Sam knew. But on the other hand, everything Bobby had taught Sam and Dean about tricksters very clearly said that their metabolisms absolutely depended on consuming lots of sugar very regularly. It didn’t make sense that Gabe would consume less of it while he was hurt.

The second thing Sam had noticed was the glimmer or glow that sometimes appeared around Gabe’s head and shoulders was definitely not just Sam’s tired imagination. It tended to happen more often when Sam got to bantering with Gabe and made him laugh, and it tended to be brighter when Gabe laughed the most, and it also tended to diminish when Gabe was being serious or if Sam began talking about one of the many depressing episodes of his own life.

The glow was also extremely pronounced when Sam relinquished the charmed agate for Gabe to perform the tracking spell with it. Gabe always seemed to be astonished that Sam was willing to trust him without the protection the agate afforded him.

Sam might not have been an expert on tricksters, or at least he hadn’t considered himself one prior to this, but he knew that he’d never read a single piece of lore that talked about trickster gods glowing in accordance with their moods. Certainly not like what Sam was observing with Gabe.

Yet Gabe had explicitly confirmed that he was, in fact, Loki.

Surely Gabe wouldn’t make such a claim unless he was truly Loki. For claiming to be a certain god when you were not was a very good way to piss that god off if they ever found out about it. Gabe didn’t strike Sam as that reckless.

The longer Sam thought about it, the more Sam was beginning to suspect that Gabe may very well be Loki, but maybe, _just maybe_, Loki wasn’t originally a pagan. There _was_ lore-based evidence for this, if Sam remembered his Edda correctly. Loki had not been among the Æsir originally but had been part of another group of powerful entities before being adopted into the Æsir by Odin. The lore generally claimed that he was jötunn, a giant. Sam couldn’t help but smile at the thought of anyone ever thinking Gabe was a giant. He seemed kinda short to Sam. Of course, Loki had a trickster’s nature, so it wouldn’t be entirely out of character for him to lie – or to let the Æsir gods assume something about him that was false.

And Sam couldn’t help but vaguely recall that Castiel had a similar glimmer about him. It had been very rare during the few days that Sam had known him, but once or twice Sam could recall seeing a very, very faint glimmer.

But that was absurd, wasn’t it? Surely a fallen star couldn’t become a pagan god, could they?

Sam shook his head. It didn’t really matter that much, did it?

Sam _had_ come to trust Gabe, even to the point of occasionally surprising himself by how much he was starting to take his friendly companionship for granted. He was even beginning to hope that, when they did find Castiel and Dean, Gabe might be willing to continue this truce. That it might be possible to have something like a continued friendship with him, once they returned to the human world.

* * *

After nearly a month aboard the ship, drifting ever eastward toward Market, Dean had been forced to relent and acknowledge that he wasn’t going to spot Sam. Worse still, he knew that his demon deal was nearly due. He could feel it down to his bones. He could only hope that Sam had somehow gotten ahead of him and was impatiently waiting for him to arrive in Market.

Hoping for that, he’d asked Jane to get them as near to Market as she could so he could finish his journey home. To whatever fate awaited him.

“Hold tight!” shouted Mr. Morris, clinging to a doorframe. “The captain’s at the helm!”

The rest of the crew scrambled to find something to hang onto as Jane wrestled with the great wooden wheel of the _Gichigami_.

It was a gorgeous day. The sky was clear and blue as the ship descended toward a lake of considerable size.

Cas had somehow convinced Dean to come to the bow of the ship, to watch the landing from there, and they steadied themselves with the rails.

It appeared that Jane usually gave the helm to Mr. Morris for a good reason. She was not particularly good at steering the ship, and the first touch of the ship’s rudders against the lake’s surface jarred the ship hard, causing her to list to the port. Several of the crew nearly lost their footing, only keeping from flying over the rails by the desperate grips they had on whatever was closest to them and nailed down.

Jane spun the wheel hard to the starboard as the bow of the ship tilted up, righting the ship’s frightening list. The stern splashed into the water first, only for a moment later for the bow to crash forward. The less than gentle landing sent a great crash of water over the bow, soaking Dean and Cas instantly.

Jane frowned a little at her less than skillful handling of her ship and then relinquished the helm to the man normally in charge of navigation, who gratefully gripped the wheel tightly and with a great sigh of relief.

From there, it was only a short and pleasant sail into an inlet with an old but surprisingly well-maintained dock. A trail led up the shore and over the hill.

* * *

Jane indicated that the trail would lead them up to the road as they disembarked, handing over the small leather lightning bolt quiver to Dean. She smiled and waved at Cas, examining the sword she’d gifted him, who was already standing on the dock: “Good luck on your journey home, the both of you. And please give my fondest regards to dear Emma for me.”

Dean shook her offered hand before deciding, to hell with it, and giving her a quick embrace. “We really owe you, Captain Morgan.”

From the dock, Cas spoke up, “How can we ever thank you enough for all the kindness you’ve shown us?”

“Don’t mention it,” Jane replied, sternly. “Truly. I do have a reputation to maintain. If this gets circulating around, I may never recover it.”

Dean went to climb down to the dock, but Jane stopped him at the last moment to whisper something in his ear.

* * *

Castiel and Dean had barely crested the hill overlooking the lake before Castiel could no longer contain his curiosity.

“What did she say to you?” he asked Dean, as he carefully picked his way over the broken paving stones.

“Huh?” Dean sounded confused. “What did Jane say when?”

“When we were disembarking, she whispered something to you. What did she say?” Castiel repeated.

“Oh. Oh that!” Dean said with a strange sounding bark of laughter. “She was just telling me that we should use the lightning to get you a Babylon candle, so you can get home at least.”

Castiel had informed Dean some time ago that the captain and her crew were aware of his species, and after Dean had finished ranting about how dangerous it was for anyone to be aware of that information, Castiel had managed to talk him down from doing something rash. After all, the captain had proven to be an excellent friend, and there was no reason to doubt that she would keep Castiel’s true nature to herself.

“You know, maybe we could barter for it, while we’re in Market,” Dean finished saying about the lightning and the candle.

* * *

The ship had landed early in the morning, and by noon Dean and Castiel had walked at least a dozen miles.

It was Dean who spotted the wagon on the road ahead first.

“Cas!” he hissed and pushed him off the road and down into the brush to hide the both of them from the passerby. The unexpected shove knocked Castiel right off his feet, and before he could try to sit back up, Dean was crouching over him, trying to conceal himself in the brush as well.

“Are you trying to break my leg again?” Castiel complained, looking up at Dean.

“Sorry, Cas,” Dean whispered, his shockingly green eyes staring down at Castiel from much too close. “I just… it’s too big of a risk to have random people see you. We can’t tell who’s friendly and who’ll want to cut your heart out.”

“But… if we keep stopping…” Castiel began to say, before Dean put a finger to his lips to shush him.

“We’re making good time,” Dean muttered lowly. “Just… let’s wait for this guy to pass.”

Castiel could tell that he was glowing from happiness at Dean’s closeness. He hoped that it wasn’t too obvious, or that Dean wouldn’t understand what it meant. But he couldn’t help but take some small joy in Dean’s finger pressed to his lips, the contact surprisingly electric, and was surprised by how even once Dean removed the finger, the phantom of the feeling remained.

While they waited for the wagon to pass, Castiel couldn’t help but ask into the space between them: “Aren’t you ever tempted?”

Dean had been anxiously listening to the sound of the wagon and the sound of the horse’s hooves on the road, so it took him a moment to turn his full attention back to Castiel’s question.

“Am I tempted by what?” he finally questioned, perhaps unsure of what Castiel could have meant, although he leaned ever so slightly closer to Castiel’s face as he spoke.

“Immortality,” Castiel clarified. “My heart.”

Dean appeared mortified by the very thought, and Castiel was certain that he must be getting very bright to look at. So he changed the question, to make it less immediately repulsive to Dean. “Perhaps, then, if it wasn’t me. If it was just some random star that you didn’t know. Would you be tempted to break your deal by taking its heart then?”

Dean took a moment to think this scenario over, before shaking his head slowly. “No. It’s my business to _save_ people, not to kill them. And anyway, immortality seems like it would be awfully lonely. Everybody I ever knew growing old and dying around me? Having to watch Sam die, _again?_ I couldn’t handle that. I wouldn’t want that.”

Castiel’s mouth twitched, and he wasn’t sure if he was trying to frown in disappointment that Dean wouldn’t want to stay with _him_ forever, or if he was trying to grin at the comfort that Dean wouldn’t kill one of his siblings for their heart if given the chance.

“I don’t think I could stand it unless my family could be with me. Then that might not be so bad,” Dean finished his thoughts on the matter.

Castiel had to look away, trying to hide some undercurrent of sadness he didn’t know how to describe. He knew that his glow had faded with that depressing commentary. He hadn’t yet considered that being an immortal among mortals would inevitably lead to heartbreak like that, and he was troubled by it.

Dean’s head perked up, listening for the wagon and no longer hearing it. “I think we’re good now,” he said, as he helped Castiel to his feet.

* * *

As Sam and Gabe neared the lake the next day, Gabe pulled the map out and laid it out on the road.

“Shall we check where your brother’s gotten to today?” Gabe said with a smile, the beginning of the shimmer already beginning to form in his golden hair.

Sam removed the agate charm, observing the way the shimmer became the brightest Sam ever saw it become when he pressed the charm into Gabe’s open hand. Sam was sure that the glow indicated that Gabe was happy and he found himself taking to trying to cause it. It was a nice feeling to know that he was responsible for making Gabe so happy that it manifested visibly. (Sam studiously ignored the slight butterfly feeling he sometimes got in his gut when Gabe laughed, or how his hand would tingle with phantom sensation for quite some time after Gabe touched him to get his attention. Surely he wasn’t so foolish as to go from wanting to kill Gabe to nursing the tiniest of crushes on him in the span of a little over a month?)

Gabe performed the spell he’d done every morning and evening for the last handful of weeks, and the agate swung wildly for a few moments before nearly yanking itself out of Gabe’s loose hold on the cord, as it incessantly jerked toward a spot on the road just twenty or so miles from where Gabe and Sam currently were.

Sam had never seen the agate behave precisely like that. “What’d that mean?”

Gabe gathered up the agate and handed it back to Sam, the glow dulling only very slightly. “It means that they’re on the ground.”

Sam could only take that to mean that they’d gotten away from the pirates somehow and were now headed toward Market on their own. He was certain that Dean would be more than happy to tell of his daring escape when they caught up with him, and he wasn’t sure if he was looking forward to the tall tale his brother would spin or dreading it. Knowing Dean, he’d probably romanced the lady pirate into letting them go, and he’d go into far too much detail about what that had entailed. Sam felt bad that poor Castiel would have been present for that.

“We should be able to catch up soon,” Sam realized, noticing how close they were to Dean’s location. He felt such a rush of overwhelming joy at the thought of _finally _ reuniting with his brother that he found himself giving Gabe a bear hug in his excitement.

The moment he realized what he was doing, he released Gabe and took a mortified step back. “Sorry,” Sam apologized. “Didn’t meant to grab you. Just got excited about finally seeing Dean again.”

Gabe’s glow suggested that Sam didn’t really need to apologize. It hadn’t sputtered out after all. Although it dimmed a little now, when Gabe gave Sam a smile utterly lacking any mirth, “It’s fine.” He looked away from Sam and began to fold up the map. “It’ll be nice to finally finish this quest. And make sure that everyone is safe and sound.”

* * *

A while later, Dean finally spoke up. “Ah, Cas? Do you know that sometimes you sorta - ” he motioned around his own head vaguely, and then finished lamely “ – glitter? Is that normal?”

Castiel’s mouth twitched again. “Let’s see if you can work it out for yourself? What do stars do?”

“Attract trouble?” Dean suggested. “And witches?”

Castiel shook his head, frowning at Dean’s teasing.

“Sorry, sorry,” Dean laughed. “I’ll try again. Is it know exactly how to annoy Dean Winchester?”

Castiel huffed the smallest of laughs, just as they came to a large stone mile marker. It read “60 miles to the Wall”.

“Dean,” Castiel said solemnly. “When is your contract due?”

“Tomorrow sometime,” Dean answered, equally serious.

“That’s not nearly enough time to get you to Elaine. It’ll take at least two days to cover that distance on foot,” Castiel remarked worriedly.

The mention of the enigmatic witch did not serve to improve Dean’s mood, nor did the realization that even if Elaine could undo the contract with Castiel’s help, they didn’t have enough time left to get to her before the hellhounds would come for Dean. They’d tarried too long aboard the _Gichigami_ in hopes of spotting Sam.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I believe that this chapter marks the end of the calm before the storm of the ending.
> 
> And I thank all of you who have stuck with me through what I considered to be the "boring middle part".


	16. The Caravan, The Ship, and Stolen Horses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean and Castiel encounter a fellow traveler and familiar face on the road, but nothing goes as planned when they ask her for aid.
> 
> Sam and Gabe observe a nautical battle and find themselves with a unique opportunity to collect some unattended horses.

Dean once again had pulled them off the road as a yellow caravan approached from behind them. But Castiel had seen the elderly woman who was at the reins of the big dun draft horse and recognized her.

“That woman is one of Jane’s friends,” Castiel said, as they hunkered below the stone bridge over a small stream. “She trades at Market near the Wall. Perhaps she could provide us with a ride?”

“Really?” Dean said, looking surprised but pleased by this good news. “You’re certain she’s a friend of the captain?”

“Yes, I am,” replied Castiel, and with that, they both charged up the embankment to catch the caravan before it went by.

“Wait!” shouted Dean, stepping out and startling the horse.

The woman reined the animal to a halt and eyed Dean suspiciously.

“My name’s Dean Winchester and this is…” he went to point toward Castiel to introduce him, but as he did so the agate around his wrist became visible as his sleeve pulled back. Ditchwater Sal pointed to it in surprise.

“Where did you ever get _that?_” she exclaimed.

“A… friend gave it to me,” Dean said, as she got down from her perch on the wagon and approached much too quickly for Dean’s liking. He drew the sword that Jane had given him, seeing as he hadn’t had the tools with him needed to repair his gun, and in doing so brought Sal up short.

“My apologies, sir,” Sal said, bringing her hands to her heart nervously as she eyed the sword warily. “I was… merely overexcited to see such a beautiful charm.”

“I guess that’s all right,” Dean acknowledged, lowering the sword slightly. “If it’s that valuable, I’d suppose I’d be willing to trade it in exchange for a Babylon candle.”

“And safe passage to Market,” Castiel chimed in, heartened that Dean’s first thought was to try to ensure Castiel’s ability to return home, but worried that Dean hadn’t requested what he required to save himself.

Ditchwater Sal shook her head, utterly ignoring Castiel’s presence and his request. “No, no, no. I don’t deal in _black_ magic.”

The look on Dean’s face was easy to read, even for Castiel. If Babylon candles were a form of black magic – or one used black magic in order to create one – it did not bode well that Elaine had had one. But it was equally clear that this was a concern for later, as he shook his head slightly. “All right. In that case, can you give us a ride then? To Market?”

“Why didn’t you say so in the first place?” Ditchwater Sal replied happily, causing Castiel to bristle at how she’d ignored him. “For that agate, I can offer you passage. Food and lodging on the way?”

“Safe passage,” Dean shot back, smart enough to recognize that he shouldn’t leave too many loop holes in his request.

“I swear that you will arrive in Market in the exact same condition that you’re in now,” Ditchwater Sal promised, holding up her hand like a pledge.

This was good enough for Dean, who put away his sword and removed the agate from his wrist, handing it over to Ditchwater Sal.

She sighed as she gripped the agate tightly in her hand.

“Do you have any idea what manner of thing it was that you had?” she asked Dean.

He shook his head.

“It would have provided you with protection from all sorts of magic. In fact, it was the exact sort of thing that would have prevented me from doing _this_,” she said, and jabbed Dean in the forehead with her pointer finger before he could do anything at all.

Castiel shouted in surprise and horror as a smoky cloud of magic engulfed Dean, scrambling for the sword that Jane had given him.

By the time the magic was done with its work, a small brown squirrel was where Dean had been standing.

“What did you do?” Castiel shouted at Sal, keeping his sword defensively between them.

But the witch did not acknowledge him, let alone answer his distressed cry.

“Much better,” Sal remarked, reaching down to collect the disoriented animal.

Castiel lunged at her with the sword, trying to keep her from picking up the squirrel-that-was-Dean, but it was as if a force field surrounded her, preventing him from touching her at all.

“Not to worry, I’ll keep my word. You shall not be harmed,” Sal was saying to Dean as she shuffled to the back of her caravan.

Castiel hurried after her and arrived around the back of the caravan in time to see Sal place Dean in a small wooden cage and provide him with an assortment of nuts and berries. “Food and lodging, just as I promised.”

“You can neither see nor hear me, can you?” Castiel addressed the witch and received no reply. “In which case, I would like to inform you that you smell of urine and you look like the anus of a dog. And if you do not return my Dean to his rightful shape, I shall be your personal poltergeist.”

* * *

Sam and Gabe had finally crested the hill that overlooked the lake.

It was a beautiful view. The lake was surrounded by verdant mountains and the water of the lake was deep blue and clear as crystal. Moored at a dock near where a path led up to the road was the sky ship, its name clearly painted in peeling golden paint along its bow: _Gichigami_. A zeppelin-like balloon was mounted where a normal ship’s sails would be.

On the shore, a red-headed man on a white horse was attempting to keep several bay horses corralled as he waited near the shoreline.

As they drew closer, Sam heard the sounds of a fight breaking out aboard the ship, which startled all the horses, including the one that the red-headed man was riding. The bay horses bolted, spreading out in all directions, while the red-head struggled to get his own horse under control.

A few minutes later, a lanky dark-haired man dressed all in black leaped from the back of the sky ship as a victorious shout went up from what Sam presumed to be the ship’s crew.

Sopping wet, the man dragged himself onto the shore where the red-haired man met him. A short exchange occurred between the two men that Sam couldn’t hear given the distance was followed by the man in black pushing the red-head from the saddle of the only remaining horse and galloping off down the road.

“I wonder what _that_ was about?” Gabe commented, glancing over at Sam. 

For a moment Sam got a little distracted by how vividly _gold_ Gabe’s eyes were, but he caught himself before it could get awkward. He could only shrug in response to the question. “No idea. It’s certainly not anything I’ve ever seen before.”

The red-haired man was now trying to find and catch one of the other horses.

Gabe placed a hand on Sam’s arm to stop him walking for a moment before whistling loud and clear. It echoed across the open expanse of the lake, and two of the loose horses picked their heads up and pricked their ears at the sound of it.

Sam looked askance at Gabe.

“Seems like a waste not to catch a ride, don’t you think?” Gabe replied with a wink as the two horses began to trot up the hill toward them.

Sam had to agree. It’d be much faster to catch up with Dean and Castiel if they could ride instead of walk.

* * *

Once Sam and Gabe had mounted up on their newly acquired horses, Sam pressed his heels into the sides of his horse, quickly urging it into a lope.

Gabe was quickly at his side with a shout of “Whoa!” He leaned over and snatched at the reins of Sam’s horse, pulling until both horses had slowed down to a jostling jog. “Take it easy there, cowboy. This ain’t the Pony Express, kid! It’ll do us no good if you lame your mount in your hurry. A jog is plenty quick enough, especially if Castiel and Dean are still on foot. They aren’t _that_ far ahead of us.”

Sam nodded. Gabe was being perfectly sensible. “Sorry. It’s just that – it’s just that there’s not very much time left. Dean’s deal has got to be nearly due.”

“When’s it due, precisely?”

“May 18th,” Sam replied. “I’ve kinda lost track of time, but it’s gotta be getting close.”

Gabe was silent, and when Sam looked over at him, there wasn’t even a hint of glimmer to be seen around him.

“Gabe?”

“Tomorrow. That’s tomorrow, Sam,” Gabe finally said, sounding sad and ancient.

Sam was stricken. Tomorrow, unless a miracle happened, hellhounds would come for his brother.

“He’ll be all right for a little while,” Gabe reassured him, reaching out to place a comforting hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Hellhounds can’t easily get into Faerie. As long as he doesn’t cross back into our world, he’ll have a little more time.”

Sam shrugged Gabe’s hand off and pressed his heels into his horse hard. The animal instantly leaped into a gallop. Sam needed – well, he wasn’t sure exactly what it was that he needed. After a moment, he pulled up on the reins, slowing his horse back to a jog. He just needed some privacy to deal with the realization that even if he did catch up with Dean today or tomorrow, unless Elaine was good to her word and the magic she intended to use was truly benign, he might have next to no time before he lost Dean for good. Worse, that this entire quest in Faerie might have cost him what little time he could have spent with Dean in the human world.

* * *

Soon enough the witch’s caravan was underway again and headed toward Market. Ditchwater Sal had placed the agate charm on a shelf within the back of the caravan, and Castiel had already decided that he would snatch it back from the witch when they arrived at Market. It seemed only fair for the deception to be repaid in kind. Besides, Castiel had made no deals with her.

“Dean!” he said, watching the squirrel closely for any sign of recognition. “If you can understand me, look at me now.”

The squirrel’s head perked up at the request but following his line of sight showed that what had caught his attention was a bag of sunflower seeds hanging on a hook on the other side of the caravan.

Castiel’s shoulders drooped in frustration. It appeared that Dean could not understand him, that he had not retained his human intelligence through the transformation. Nonetheless, he turned and retrieved a handful of sunflower seeds from the bag and gently pressed them through the bars of the little cage so Dean could eat to his tiny heart’s content.

Dean happily began to gobble the seeds, and while Castiel was pleased to so easily make his friend happy, he already missed his company.

He sat down, feeling no small amount of foreboding. Although it was quite probable that Ditchwater Sal would be good to the letter of her word and return Dean to his rightful shape when they reached Market, Castiel was dreading tomorrow.

He hadn’t missed that the witch Elaine had been in possession of a Babylon candle, which was apparently the product of black magic. Dean had said that he and his brother had gone to hunt her over deaths she had admitted to being responsible for. Even if she was good to her word about being able to break Dean’s contract, Castiel couldn’t help but feel certain that it would involve his death for his heart.

His hand strayed to his chest as he considered it.

“In heaven,” Castiel began, addressing Dean even if he knew that Dean could not understand him, “we are not encouraged to feel as humans do. We know little of even the simplest of mortal emotions – not joy or sadness, not hate or love. Yet we have watched for eons how these inexplicable, ephemeral feelings have motivated the greatest achievements and the greatest tragedies of mankind.”

Castiel paused to collect his thoughts, to try to get the words right. He wanted to get the words right, even if it was just for his own benefit. “I have observed centuries and centuries of all the beautiful and terrible ways that humans love one another. It was often the only thing that made observing your world bearable through all the horrors that mankind has inflicted upon one another. There is nothing else like love anywhere in the vastness of the universe.”

The squirrel’s ears pricked toward Castiel, but no doubt it was just out of curiosity at the stream of noise that he was making. But Castiel wished to finish his confession, if only to get it off his chest. “I know that love is unconditional. It is also unpredictable and unexpected and uncontrollable. And, to be honest, unexpectedly easy to mistake for loathing.”

He closed his eyes for a moment, hoping that none of his siblings were paying him any attention, given that what he had to say next meant that he had well and truly fallen beyond any hope of returning. (His siblings would see this and his decision to try to save Dean from damnation as betrayal.) “What I mean to say, Dean, is that I think I have fallen in love with you.”

He pressed the palm of his hand to his chest, where his heart ached. “My heart… With you, it often feels like my chest can barely contain it. Like it doesn’t truly belong to me anymore. I think it belongs to you. If you wanted it, I’d gladly give it to you.”

“If it is my heart that is required to free you from your contract,” Castiel swallowed nervously. “I would gladly sacrifice it for you. You – you would be worth it. And if the world was kind, I’d wish only to know that you love me as well.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The love confession scene was always going to be a challenge to adapt, and I knew that. It was daunting to write when I reached it. However, I'm quite pleased with what I eventually came up with, and I hope that you have found it to be satisfying as well.


	17. Secrets and Answers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ditchwater Sal holds up her end of the bargain and Dean and Castiel arrive in Market.
> 
> Sam and Gabe arrive shortly thereafter, but cannot locate where precisely Dean and Castiel are within the town.

Night had fallen by the time that Ditchwater Sal’s caravan rolled into Market.

Castiel snatched up the agate and placed it in his pocket, as Sal removed Dean from his tiny cage.

“Market, as promised,” Sal told the squirrel, as she sat him down on the ground. “Though you may have some trouble getting around for a while. Transformation tends to leave the brain a bit scrambled for a time.”

She tapped him on his furry back, and the magical smoke consumed his tiny body, growing upward and outward until it faded away to reveal Dean, once again human.

“You…” Dean began to accuse, swaying unevenly on his feet and pulling his sword from its scabbard. But that was all he could accomplish before he collapsed onto the cobblestone street.

Castiel was instantly at his side, trying to help him to sit up but only accomplishing getting him to roll onto his back.

“I warned ya,” Ditchwater Sal laughed. “Save your strength.” Having clearly dismissed Dean as not a threat, she returned to her caravan, leaving Dean to fend for himself.

Castiel leaned over Dean, unable to stop himself from checking Dean for any injury. He even went so far as to attempt a healing touch to his forehead, although Castiel knew that his powers within Faerie did not extend to healing.

“I’ve been so worried about you,” Castiel remarked in relief at finding Dean unharmed.

“Sam?” Dean asked, clearly extremely disoriented.

Castiel shook his head slightly. “No, Dean. Your brother is not here. Come on, though. There’s an inn over there.”

It was fortunate, Castiel thought, that the witch had dropped them off right in front of a surprisingly nice looking inn, even if the name left something to be desired: _The Slaughtered Prince_.

“Your deal isn’t due just yet, and I think you’ll need a night to sleep whatever this witch did off before we go to meet Elaine,” Castiel told Dean, slipping the agate into Dean’s breast pocket and picking up the sword he’d dropped, before pulling Dean onto his unsteady feet. “Come on. Come on.”

* * *

Dean woke up in a surprisingly nice bed. Better than the one he’d had aboard the _Gichigami_ even. He couldn’t quite recall how he’d gotten here, but he did remember being transformed into a squirrel. It was how he had become human again that was more than a little fuzzy.

He got up, pleased to find that the world wasn’t spinning in a sickening fashion anymore. Castiel wasn’t anywhere to be seen, even though he was quite certain that the witch had been unable to perceive him, and so he should have been all right. Surely he wouldn’t have gone far. Not after…

Well, not after what he’d said in the caravan when he’d thought Dean couldn’t understand him.

The sound of bathwater sloshing behind one of those three-panel room dividers told Dean where to look. He peered through a tiny window in one of the panels to spot Castiel relaxing in the warm water of the bathtub. Dean was surprised with himself when he wasn’t terribly self-conscious about looking at somebody who appeared, at least, to be a man and still, shockingly, _wanting_ to be _with_ him. _Like that._

If Dean was honest with himself – and if there was ever a time to be honest with one’s self, it had to be the day you were likely going to be dragged to Hell come morning – he could admit that he’d fallen for Cas, too. And given that he was already damned, he may as well make the most of what small amount of time he had left. He wasn’t holding out much hope that Elaine meant Cas any good and because of that, Dean was ready to meet his fate, rather than allow someone else to die for him.

“Are you in my bath, Cas?” Dean finally decided to announce his presence.

Cas startled in the bath and covered himself, flushing scarlet at the realization that Dean had seen him naked.

“I did not think it was good manners to spy on someone while they were bathing,” Castiel grumbled.

Dean stepped away from the divider and laughed. “All right. All right. I’m not looking. I’ll turn away.”

A moment later, Dean heard Cas get out of the bath. He nearly turned to take a peek but thought better of it.

“All right, you may look again,” Cas announced, and when Dean turned he found Cas standing behind him in nothing more than a bath towel.

Dean took a deep, steadying breath before he asked the question that had been weighing on his mind since the ride into Market: “Did you really mean what you said in the caravan?”

“What I…?” Cas began, unsure of what Dean could mean, and then realization crossed his face. Cas started and stared at him for several long seconds. Blue eyes went wide with surprise and no small amount of mortification. “But… but… you were a squirrel! You wanted sunflower seeds! You didn’t… I asked you to show me that you understood.” Cas covered his face as he realized that Dean had intentionally allowed him to believe that he couldn’t understand when he was transformed.

“I wondered what you might say,” Dean shrugged. “And then you were saying such nice things. I figured you might stop if you knew. I didn’t mean to embarrass you.” He crossed the room and laid a hand on Castiel’s shoulder, gently pulling him toward himself, until they were nearly in an embrace.

“Do you want to know what the captain really told me that day?” Dean asked Cas, trying not to chicken out. He already knew how Cas felt about him. This should be the easiest thing in the world. (It wasn’t.) “She suggested that I get my head out of my ass and see that I was in love with you. ‘Cause life is short and all that.”

Cas’s hands fell away from his face and he began to glow as he smiled hesitantly at Dean.

“And she was right about that,” Dean finished, smiling right back at Cas, leaning in to _finally_ kiss him, feeling grateful that he could have this, that he could be with Cas, even if it was only for a single night.

* * *

Sam and Gabe arrived in Market well into the night. They had stopped a few times to try to use the map and the agate to pinpoint Dean’s location, and the best they’d been able to determine was that he was _somewhere_ within the town of Market. Beyond that, the agate simply wasn’t a precise enough instrument to make out.

It was, however, very late and Sam was already struggling to keep his eyes open. When he nearly fell while dismounting, Gabe had spoken up: “I get that you’re worried about Dean. I really do. But we’re not going to find either of them tonight. You should try to get a little sleep and we can look for him in the morning. Maybe get a map of just Market to try the agate on.”

Sam didn’t want to admit that Gabe was correct. Every minute he waited to locate Dean was yet another minute he might never be able to get back. However, Sam also knew that Dean would have likely holed up in one of the many inns for the night, and there wasn’t any chance that the innkeepers would appreciate him searching each and every one at this time of night. Gabe’s suggestion only made _sense_.

_The Slaughtered Prince_ appeared to be the nicest of the inns available that still had vacancies, however it did not have any accommodation for the horses, and so Sam sought out the inn kitty-corner to it. It wasn’t quite as nice, but it did have stables.

Once they’d paid for their room and taken care of the horses, Sam stumbled up the stairs and almost collapsed onto his bed.

Gabe hovered nearby, before wandering to the window to stare out at the street below. Sam couldn’t blame him for it. Gabe didn’t need to sleep when he wasn’t hurt, and Sam could imagine waiting for a sleeping companion to finish with their nightly rest would have to be extremely boring. At least watching the street would have some entertainment value. And it was significantly less creepy to imagine Gabe staring morosely out the window all night than it was to think that Gabe might spend all night watching him. (Sam was certain that Castiel had done exactly that to Dean and was still surprised that Dean either hadn’t noticed or hadn’t cared.)

In the morning, Sam thought, they would procure a map of Market and they’d use it to find Dean and Castiel with the agate. Gabe would be correct about hellhounds not being able to cross into Faerie very easily, and there would be time left to seek Elaine, and everything would be all right. Everything would go back to how it had been before Sam had been kidnapped by Yellow-Eyes and Dean had sold his soul to resurrect him…

Sam’s wishful thinking ground to a halt. It wasn’t that Sam didn’t want all of that to happen. He wanted Dean to be all right more than anything in the world because he couldn’t bear the thought of being without him.

But if tomorrow went the way he wanted it to, it meant that his alliance or truce or whatever this had been with Gabe would finally conclude. Sam might not want to kill him anymore, but he didn’t think that Gabe would be inclined to stay in contact with him. Sam realized that, regardless of how Gabe thought of him, Sam had come to think of Gabe as a friend. And tomorrow would likely mark the end of that friendship, as they both went their separate ways.

That was a surprisingly painful thought.

Idly, Sam considered for just a moment whether or not he should go ahead and ask Gabe about the theory he’d come up with about Gabe being a star tomorrow, before Gabe disappeared out of his life. Then Sam found himself considering what Gabe would have to think about that. Gabe had already expressed some doubt about whether or not Sam would sacrifice an innocent star to save Dean. Sam’s answer at the time had not been a reassuring one for either of them.

Surely Gabe would be upset to know that Sam had guessed what he’d clearly gone to great lengths to keep a secret. He might even assume that Sam would mean to sacrifice _him_ for Dean instead of Castiel. Sam had wanted him dead before after all. Sam had had _reason_ to want him dead. Yes, it seemed all too likely that Gabe would assume that Sam could and would kill him in order to save Dean.

Sam didn’t want to do that, though. And he didn’t want to frighten Gabe about his secret being known. He didn’t want Gabe to feel that he had to run…

* * *

Gabriel knew he was glimmering a little, watching Sam fall asleep. It was difficult to keep his happiness under wraps. Everything was working out as perfectly as it possibly could under the circumstances, and if that wasn’t reason to mentally celebrate, Gabriel didn’t know what was.

It seemed that Castiel had safely arrived in Market. Or so Gabriel could only assume. Sam had seemed adamant that his brother would not leave Castiel behind, and while Gabriel might have had misgivings about the idea of entrusting anything to someone as frequently boneheaded as Dean Winchester could be, he did trust Sam’s judgement of his brother’s character.

While it was difficult for Gabriel to track _anything_ in Faerie, he was confident that he could find his brother and Sam’s brother tomorrow.

From there, they’d have to see what could be done about Dean’s demon deal.

A sudden and unpleasant realization crossed Gabriel’s mind. He could help Sam find Castiel and Dean. He might even be able to sneak Sam and Dean a method to get Castiel back home to Heaven, but he couldn’t allow Castiel to see him.

That would be disastrous. Even if Castiel didn’t immediately recognize him as his long-lost brother, surely Castiel would ask all sorts of awkward questions that would be _terribly_ difficult to answer. And Castiel wouldn’t be nearly as easily fooled by the bullshit he usually used to trick humans.

Gabriel had been playing with fire this entire time, interacting as much as he had with the vessels. It had been a long shot right from the start, this insane plan of Elaine’s, and he’d never ever intended to get this close to either brother.

But he couldn’t let Sam get incinerated by the Witch Queen, either. Afterward, it would have been irresponsible of him to leave Sam to fend for himself in Faerie after he’d been separated from Dean. (He might have reconsidered if he’d known about the agate, but he hadn’t and by the time that he did, it wasn’t as if he could just up and leave, now could he?)

He’d told himself it was because Sam was important to the Heavenly Plan, and there was a certain amount of plausible deniability he could spin for Heaven’s benefit in ensuring that Sam didn’t get himself killed before he could fulfill his destiny. But the honest truth was that he’d had a soft spot for Sam for some time now.

Gabriel had picked up a lot of grudging respect for both brothers when they’d _actually_ surprised him with their little trick back in Ohio. He’d appreciated Dean’s similar sense of humor, even if he was off-put by how much Dean reminded him of Michael. But Sam! Sam might be meant for Lucifer and had certain similarities with him, but the Morningstar had never had even a fraction of Sam’s natural compassion and a good deal less of Sam’s cleverness.

The whole Mystery Spot debacle had really only made the whole thing worse. Gabriel had found himself _empathizing_ with Sam! Which was why he couldn’t help but relent when Sam had _asked_ for mercy, rather than making demands or trying to kill him, as Gabriel had expected out of the confrontation.

But, of course, that was also why Sam would probably return to wanting him dead after he was reunited with his brother. Gabriel knew better than to think that this alliance had been anything other than one of convenience for the both of them. Just because they’d ended up saving one another a couple of times didn’t change anything. Not with the way Sam loved his brother. Not with the way that Gabriel had hurt him.

If Sam found out that Gabriel and Castiel were the same species… Gabriel knew that Sam wouldn’t hesitate to try to kill him if he thought it would save Dean.

Not to mention it would probably put Gabriel squarely in Heaven’s crosshairs. Castiel would probably gladly tell Heaven about their misplaced brother and regain Heaven’s favor in the process.

No, Gabriel was going to have to locate Castiel tomorrow and then make good his escape.

And didn’t it just beat all that he was _upset_ about having to leave Sam’s side for good? He should want to. It didn’t make a lick of sense to stay when his entire way of life could be compromised in an instant. But goddamn it all, he’d gone and…

He’d gotten used to Sam’s company was all. It’d been _nice_ to have something approximating an actual friendship. And to even have the option to _pretend_ that Sam trusted him. As messed up as all that probably was. (Gabriel still struggled to believe that Sam would willingly hand over an agate that prevented Gabriel from messing with Sam in any way, because absolutely no one trusted a trickster.) 

It wasn’t anything else. And it couldn’t be anything else.

There was no glow around Gabriel anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you were hoping that I might write a proper sex scene, I am sorry to disappoint you. I suppose I'm still a bit shy about trying my hand at that.
> 
> However, should anyone reading this at any point in the future decide that they would like to write the sex scene(s) that I am unwilling to, consider this blanket permission to do so.


	18. Do Not Cross the Wall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the morning, Dean chooses to risk being attacked by hellhounds in order to seek out Elaine and finally learn what she wanted from Castiel and if there's any hope for Dean avoiding damnation.
> 
> Castiel wakes to find an empty bed and an alarming message from Dean.
> 
> Sam and Gabe finally spot Castiel... as he heads toward the gap in the Wall after Dean.
> 
> And the dangerous forces within Faerie that have been seeking Castiel are drawing very close.

Dean barely slept afterward. For one, he’d only just woken from a couple hour nap that had resulted from his being transformed from human to squirrel and then back again. For another, he couldn’t bear to sleep away what few hours he still had with Cas. So he was well awake by the time the first light of morning began to stream through the windows of the inn, as Cas dozed beside him.

Quietly, so as not to wake Cas, he reached for the pocketknife he’d placed on his nightstand, and carefully, carefully he cut a lock of hair from just above the nape of Cas’s neck. He couldn’t risk taking Cas with him to see Elaine, but he also couldn’t take the risk that Elaine didn’t have a method of using a star to break his contract that would save him and not harm Cas in the process. Surely Elaine would be able to tell that the lock of hair came from a star and would either be able to do the spell with only that, or it would at least let her know that he’d fulfilled his end of the bargain. Perhaps he could convince her to say what she required of Cas.

He placed the lock of hair in a lacy handkerchief that he’d found in his coat pocket, and then he quietly dressed before running down the stairs to the lobby.

The innkeeper was apparently still sleeping off last night’s high, but Dean woke him all the same.

“What?” the innkeeper asked from where he was sleepily lounged on a broken-down old sofa in the lobby. “What do you want?”

“I need a piece of paper and a pen,” Dean requested, pulling on his overcoat.

“Ask me again at a more reasonable hour,” the innkeeper grumbled.

“No, I can’t. I need to go,” Dean snapped, before sighing and saying, “Look, if my friend wakes up before I get back – if I get back – can you give him a message for me?”

“Go on,” the innkeeper relented.

* * *

“You know,” Castiel said, finally stirring from the most restful slumber he’d ever had in the entirety of his existence, “that’s the first time I’ve ever slept at night.”

He rolled over in the bed, expecting to find Dean there, and having his heart stutter in surprise and pain when he discovered that the other side of the bed was empty and cold. Dean was nowhere to be seen and all his clothes and things were missing. 

“Dean?” he questioned, hoping that Dean was nearby but dreading that his suspicions were correct and that Dean had gone.

* * *

It took a few minutes for Castiel to put all his clothes on so he could go downstairs and search for Dean. He neglected to collect his sword, as he did not think that it was necessary to arm himself to go down to the lobby.

“Have you seen my friend?” he asked the innkeeper when he made it to the lobby.

“He left absurdly early,” the innkeeper replied, taking a shot of amber liquid.

Cas’s heart lurched again. “He left?”

“He told me to tell you,” the innkeeper began, before blandly reciting Dean’s message: “He’s gone to see Elaine about his deal. That he doesn’t want you to go near her. That he’s got to handle this on his own and meet his fate head-on. And to tell someone named Sam that when you see him that he tried, he really did and that Sam’ll know the rest.”

“What?” Castiel said, certain that he must have misheard. Surely Dean wasn’t going to… Surely he wasn’t going to let himself be dragged to Hell. Surely the man had misremembered the message. “Are you certain?”

“I’m positive,” the innkeeper said.

* * *

Castiel found himself walking out the inn’s door, heedless of the fact that his clothing was still a bit askew from how quickly and carelessly he’d thrown them on. He only knew that Dean had left hours ago, to cross over into the human world where hellhounds would likely be waiting for him.

It wasn’t far from Market to the Wall. Dean had likely already crossed. He could be speaking with the witch right now. If the hounds hadn’t gotten to him first.

Castiel could feel his heart breaking. He loved Dean, even now when Dean had abandoned him to go alone to his death. He loved Dean, and Dean was going to die. He might already be dead.

He walked without really seeing where he was going. He had to go to the Wall. He needed to cross over it and find Dean. He’d beg Elaine to take his heart and save Dean if there was still time.

* * *

“Wake up! Wake up!”

Sam woke with a start, scrambling for a weapon, as Gabe shook his shoulder.

“Wha-?” Sam mumbled, still half asleep and trying to work out what had Gabe so panicked sounding.

“Get up!” Gabe shouted, all but pulling him out of bed. “I saw Castiel!”

“What?!” Sam yelped.

“Across the street, leaving _The Slaughtered Prince_,” Gabe explained hurriedly, shoving Sam’s boots into his hands. “He’s headed out of town toward the Wall.”

“Did you see Dean?” Sam asked, pulling on his boots as quickly as he could.

“No!” snapped Gabe sounding increasingly upset and already headed for the door. “I’m not sure what’s going on, but we need to make sure that Castiel doesn’t cross the Wall!”

“What? Why?” Sam was terribly confused by why that was so upsetting to Gabe, hopping after him as he tugged on his boot.

“Because he’ll _die!_ If Castiel crosses the Wall, he’ll turn into nothing more than a lump of rock and metal!” Gabe exclaimed, already halfway down the stairs to the lobby. “We need to get to him before he can!”

Sam’s thoughts spun in several different directions at that revelation.

How could Gabe be a star and also exist in the human world, if stars couldn’t leave Faerie without dying? (Maybe Sam had been wrong in how he’d connected the dots? Or was Gabe in danger if he crossed over now?)

But more importantly, Castiel was in immediate danger and Sam wasn’t about to let anything happen to the star if he could help it.

They were both sprinting by the time they were out the door of the inn, forgetting all about the horses they’d stabled the night before.

* * *

Dean had crossed over the Wall early, when the sun was still very low in the sky.

He’d stepped from the meadow in Faerie into the ancient forest in Michigan with trepidation, some part of himself prepared to instantly come under attack by hellhounds.

Yet nothing happened. Not even so much as a far-off howl.

He let loose the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding and set off down the path toward the witch’s house.

* * *

Dean pounded on the front door of the witch’s house with his fist. His other hand rested on his newly repaired gun, still containing a full clip of witch killer bullets.

Sounds of footsteps within the cabin were soon followed by the click of the door lock.

Elaine opened the door, her hair still mussed from sleep and dressed in flannel pajamas and a hastily tied bathrobe.

It took her a moment to blink away the sleep from her eyes, and she frowned in confusion as she looked up at him. “Dean? Dean Winchester?”

Dean didn’t bother with pleasantries, instead growling, “Yeah, it’s me. We found the star. What did you need him for?” Before she could respond, Dean had already pulled the gun from his belt and pressed the barrel to her temple. She had the audacity to look surprised.

“Here’s proof, if you need it,” Dean snapped, shoving the folded handkerchief that contained the lock of Cas’s hair toward her.

She gingerly reached for the handkerchief and took it from Dean.

“I see,” she remarked, not unfolding it. She glanced back up at Dean, searching for something in his expression. “Will you put down the gun?”

Dean frowned and thumbed the safety off.

“Look,” Elaine said with a sigh. “I take it that you’ve had a run in with the witches of Faerie? The sort that would have wanted his heart for themselves?”

Dean narrowed his eyes. “Yeah, so do you need his heart or not? ‘Cause I’m not gonna let you take it. I’ll go to Hell first.”

Elaine’s stare became piercing at that declaration. “I don’t think that I need to do anything at all. Is your brother keeping him company?”

Dean didn’t answer her, still not sure what was going on here or why he wasn’t just putting a bullet in her brain.

She seemed to recognize his hesitance to answer for what it was. Dean didn’t want to tell her because he didn’t want to admit that Cas was alone over there. “You need to go back right now,” she told him sternly. “If he crosses the Wall after you, he dies.”

“What?” Dean said, surprised by her tone, and the way her final statement had sounded less like a threat and more like a concerned warning.

She drew his attention to her hands and the handkerchief she still held. She opened it and let the sparkly, rocky dust that was now all that it contained fall from it. 

_Stardust…_

A bolt of terror flew down Dean’s spine. Cas couldn’t cross the Wall, and Dean had left him there all alone. To wake up alone to an empty bed. To wander downstairs to find the message that Dean had left him, that could quite correctly be interpreted as Dean’s last will and testament.

“Quickly!” Elaine snapped him out of his horrified realization, pointing back the way he’d came. “Go!”

Dean didn’t need to be told twice.

* * *

Gabe could be deceptively fast when he wanted to be, but he wasn’t nearly as practiced as Sam was at long distance running. He also had shorter legs.

Consequently, Sam had soon outpaced him as they raced out of Market toward the gap in the Wall.

Sam had run flat out, not concerning himself with how his lungs burned or how he was certain that he’d twisted his ankle at least once already. Yet he still couldn’t see Castiel.

It wasn’t until he broke through the tree-line into the meadow that he caught sight of Castiel. He was walking slowly, with a thousand-yard stare, and he was headed right for the gap in the Wall.

Sam shouted for him, trying to catch his attention: “Castiel!”

Castiel appeared unable to hear him.

Sam threw himself into one last desperate sprint, hoping that he could catch up before Castiel stepped across the border. As fast as he was, he wasn’t sure that he could. Castiel was already _so very close_ to the gap.

Castiel placed a foot on the fallen stones of the gap. One step further and he’d be lost.

Sam reached out and grabbed his arm at the very last second. “STOP!”

Castiel turned, looking bewildered. “Sam?”

“You can’t cross the Wall,” Sam said through huffs. “You can’t cross the Wall. You’ll die if you cross the Wall. Turn to stone.”

Castiel’s eyes widened in horror at what he’d nearly done. He hurriedly took a step or two back from the gap.

Gabe caught up with them, then. “Is he all right? Is Castiel okay?”

Castiel turned his head toward the newcomer and cocked his head to one side in absolute confusion.

Sam assumed that Castiel was curious about who Gabe was and took it upon himself to introduce the two of them to one another: “Castiel this is Gabe. Gabe this is Castiel.”

“Gabriel?” Castiel questioned, staring hard at Gabe.

That was an unexpected response. Wasn’t Gabe’s real name Loki?

Before anything else could be said, a great black carriage drawn by four black horses rattled across the meadow and drew to a halt besides the three of them.

The door on the side of the carriage and an elderly woman in an elegant dress stepped from it. She was bent nearly double and her skin was wrinkled with immense age. A ragged and ugly red wig was perched atop patchy strands of silver hair.

She looked familiar. It took a moment for Sam to realize that she looked like a _much_ older version of the witch from the fake inn, weeks and weeks ago.

“Now what’s this?” the witch remarked. “Planning on entering the human realm? If you seek death, my dear, I’d be more than happy to assist you.”

Sam pulled at Castiel’s arm, urging him to back away from the witch, even as he stepped in front of him. The agate charm had its limitations, but he was by far the most protected of the three of them from witch magic.

The witch looked at each of them in turn, before settling her gaze on Sam for a moment.

“Hmm, now what to do with you,” she murmured.

Sam reached for a knife at his belt, the only weapon he’d had on him in his hurry to leave the inn, but the witch must have seen what he was doing. She twirled her fingers and an impossibly slim but strong silvery chain wrapped around his wrists and bound his hands.

“I can’t have you doing that,” she remarked casually, completely unperturbed by Sam’s unsuccessful attempt at attacking her.

Gabe strode forward, readying himself to snap his fingers and do – something.

But Sam never found out what it was Gabe intended, because the witch cackled and pointed at Gabe, as she barked out a spell: “Adligetur fera!” A splash of purple-colored magic struck him in the chest, burning the grass between the witch and Gabe, leaving behind the strong scent of burnt sage and burdock, and he fell to his knees with an oomph.

“Gabe?” Sam called out, fearful when Gabe didn’t immediately get back to his feet. He tried to take a step toward Gabe, but the chain around his wrist went taunt and he found himself unable to do so.

“How delightful!” the witch laughed. “I had prepared that spell to subdue _you_, my dear.” She nodded toward Castiel. “But what a glorious surprise to find a second star. And such a very powerful one.”

She strode toward Gabe, who couldn’t seem to stand no matter how he struggled to get his feet under him. “You’re a bit careworn, though, aren’t you? A bit sad around the edges.”

Sam wanted to shout at her. He wanted to do something to stop her from getting close to Gabe. But the silver chain prevented him from doing anything of the sort.

The witch absently gestured toward Castiel. Another of the silver chains appeared around his wrists.

“Now then, I think it is time to go,” the witch remarked, pulling Gabe toward the carriage by his shirt collar. Gabe didn’t seem to have the strength or coordination to fight against her, even when she pushed him into the carriage. “You two may ride in the carriage or be dragged behind it. The choice is yours.” She eyed Sam appreciatively. “It has been a long time since my sisters and I have had a slave to tidy for us.”

Sam looked over at Castiel. Whatever kind of magic the silver chain was, Sam didn’t think he could break free of it. Trying to refuse the witch’s command would only cause the two of them harm.

Seeing no other alternative, Sam and Castiel willingly climbed into the carriage with Gabe. The witch did not join them, but instead climbed onto the driver’s seat on the outside of the carriage, and all too soon they were in motion, headed toward whatever destination and fate the witch had in mind for each of them.

* * *

_If anyone had been in the meadow by the Wall to observe the goings on immediately after the witch had departed, they would have seen a dark-haired man dressed entirely in black gallop up along the wall from the south._

_He rode a white horse with grey dappling on its legs, and its body was flecked with sweat and foam. Its sides heaved with exertion, but he paid the animal’s discomfort no mind._

_He reined it to a sudden halt at the gap at the Wall and observed the markings in the grass there. There were imprints of Sam and Castiel and Gabe’s footprints still, and the burnt line of grass that stretched outward from next to the set of wheel ruts of the carriage that had once belonged to Primus._

_All the footprints disappeared into the carriage and the ruts led off to the north and west. Toward Carnadine, the great fortress and palace of the three sisters, each a queen among the witches of Faerie._

_The man rightly guessed that what he sought was still upon the person of one of the individuals that had gathered here and been captured, and so he spurred his exhausted mount in its bleeding sides until it leaped back into a gallop. The throne of Stormhold was his for the taking and for all time, if only he retrieved the ruby and took the heart of the star._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm very excited to see what is made of this chapter and the next few. This chapter and the next couple contain my favorite scenes from Stardust, and I had a blast trying to adapt them.
> 
> I certainly think that they turned out nicely, and I only feel ever so slightly evil in having this chapter end in such a lovely cliffhanger.


	19. Carnadine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam, Gabriel, and Castiel have been captured by the Witch Queen and are being taken to her stronghold.
> 
> Meanwhile, Dean follows after them in hopes of rescuing Castiel from a grisly fate and encounters an unlikely ally.

Dean clamored up the river bank toward the gap in the Wall. For a moment he panicked at seeing no evidence of anyone in the meadow but then relaxed marginally when he _also_ did not see a human-sized meteorite where there ought to be none.

Dean stepped up to the gap, still anxious to see if he could spot Cas in the tree-line on the other side of the meadow. His eyes fell to the scorched line of grass and then to the scattered footprints in the grass that had not been disturbed when he’d originally passed this way earlier in the morning. Dean may not have been particularly good at reading the stories that footprints and wheel-marks had to say, but he _knew_ that something bad had happened here, and that several people had been involved in it. And it appeared that one of them had been a witch with a penchant for throwing around fire. It screamed to him that the witch from the fake inn had finally caught up with Cas.

Dean could also guess that everyone that had been present had been taken away in a wagon or carriage.

He took a few aborted steps in the direction that the wagon tracks led off in but despaired at the thought of trying to catch up to it on foot. It was impossible. By the time he caught up to it, the witch would surely have already killed Cas and devoured his heart.

The sound of hooves on dirt surprised him out of his morose thoughts.

On the other side of the Wall was Elaine. She was fully dressed now and riding a quarter horse fully outfitted with Western-style tack. Upon reaching the gap, she dismounted.

The horse tossed its head and pawed the ground impatiently. It was a mare, with a mostly brilliantly white coat, except for a patch of brown that covered her ears and the very top of her head and another larger patch of brown was splashed across her chest.

“Dean!” Elaine called out. “It occurred to me after you ran off that you might be in need of a faster kind of transportation than walking.”

Dean stepped back over the gap to accept the reins that she was holding out for him to take. He had to admit that he hadn’t spent a lot of time on horseback, but it wasn’t as if he’d never ridden before. “Uh, thanks,” he told her, surprised by how helpful she was being after he’d threatened to shoot her in the head less than a half hour ago.

“Anytime,” she replied with a smug grin. “Now go find your brother and your star. And please do tell Loki that I’ll need his help with a project when you see him. Vessel constructs are tricky, even for me.”

Dean swung himself up into the saddle. “Got it.” Then the last name she’d thrown out in that request filtered into his brain. “Wait a minute. Did you say Loki?”

“There’s no time for that,” Elaine said quickly and slapped the mare on the hindquarters, causing her to bolt through the gap. “Go!”

* * *

The carriage rattled as the witch pushed the horses to their limits.

Castiel sat on the seat facing the front of the carriage, while Sam and Gabe sat on the seat opposite.

For a while, no one spoke. Castiel was ashen looking and flinched with each bump that the carriage flew over. Sam could easily imagine that Castiel was terrified of what was going to happen to him. For his part, Sam wasn’t sure that it was wise to speak with Castiel about Dean and risk the witch overhearing them.

Instead, he reached over with his bound hands and tried to squeeze Castiel’s shoulder in a manner that he hoped would be reassuring. Whispering as softly as he could while still being certain that Castiel could hear him, Sam muttered, “It’s all right. I promise I won’t let her hurt you.”

Castiel shook his head, looking terribly close to tears and looked out the window at the passing countryside.

Unsure what else he could do for Castiel, he turned his attention to Gabe.

Gabe wasn’t unconscious, but he was pretty far from lucidity. It was as if he was shit-faced drunk. He didn’t seem to be able to coordinate his movements and Sam wasn’t entirely sure that he even knew where he was.

“Gabe?” he whispered, leaning in close so he didn’t have to speak loudly. “Hey, Gabe, can you understand me?

Gabe glimmered a little and, although he didn’t open his eyes, a dreamy smile appeared on his face. “Ssam?” Gabe mumbled, slurring Sam’s name badly.

“Yeah, I’m here,” Sam replied, wishing he could wrap his arms around Gabe but quickly being reminded that his hands were bound together when he tried.

Gabe didn’t say anything else, just leaned into Sam’s side and appeared to pass out.

Sam turned back to Castiel, who was now staring at Gabe snuggling up to Sam with the most heartbreaking expression Sam had ever seen.

“Why did you call him Gabriel?” Sam suddenly asked.

“That is his name,” Castiel answered simply.

Sam looked down at his friend, who had just clumsily tangled his hand into the fabric of Sam’s shirt.

“He is a star then?” Sam asked, not really surprised by the revelation, but feeling a certain kind of despair that Gabe was in such danger because of his association with Sam.

“Gabriel is one of my brothers, yes,” Castiel confirmed, “but… how much astronomy do you know?”

Sam shrugged, “A little. Enough.”

“To compare us to the sort of star you would understand, I am but an average star in size and luminosity, not unlike the star you know as the sun. Gabriel would be like the red-giant Arcturus in comparison, the fourth-brightest star in the sky,” Castiel explained.

Somewhere in the back of Sam’s mind, something pinged. Castiel’s name was familiar, wasn’t it? Something he’d read somewhere once, and for some reason it was connected with the name Gabriel, which was in turn connected in a rather important way to the number four.

Perhaps if he’d had more time to think it over, he might have gotten it, but the carriage had arrived at its destination, and Sam had no more time to ponder why the names Gabriel and Castiel were connected in his head.

* * *

The witch ushered them from the carriage into a great hall made of black stone in the bottom of a limestone gorge. The entire place gave Sam an instant chill. It smelled of death and decay, and there were many cages filled with half starved animals of every description.

Two similarly elderly-looking women greeted them at the door, calling out to the witch that had captured them as “sister”. One was rail thin with a fur hat and a black dress with red accents. The other was obese with an ugly brown wig and wearing a black dress with purple accents.

“The star!” one of the sisters remarked, and then corrected herself as she noticed Gabe clinging to Sam’s arm, still too out of it to walk unaided or to even recognize that he was in danger. “Two stars! Remarkable!”

“And who else?” the other sister asked, taking note of Sam’s distinct lack of celestial origins.

“A slave for us,” the eldest witch explained. “It will be nice to have someone to help us mop up when we’ve finished with our guests.”

“Oh, good work, sister,” the rail-thin witch remarked, sounding distinctly pleased by the prospect of having two hearts to eat instead of just one in addition to gaining a slave. Sam could only be repulsed by all three witches. It was unthinkable to him to wish to harm another being the way they were clearly capable of, and slavery was equally horrific.

“And just in time, I see! You look awful!” the rail-thin witch continued, and then all three of them cackled at what appeared to be some kind of bizarre and morbid joke between them.

The silver chain was dismissed from Sam and Castiel’s wrists after the obese witch had disarmed Sam. For a moment, Sam considered if he should try to attack the witches even without any weapons. But he knew that their appearances could be deceiving. Just because they looked frail did not mean that they were, and the agate had its limitations. They could not bespell him directly, but they could still harm him with conventional weapons or restrain him with the silver chain again. He could only hope that an opportunity to slay them would present itself while they were paying him less attention.

The eldest witch and the obese witch took Castiel by his arms and pulled him toward the two curved staircases that led up to a large landing above a fountain, upon which was a flat stone table. Castiel half-heartedly struggled but he did not put up anything like a true fight against them.

Once the witches had dragged Castiel up the stairs, they pushed him down onto the table and restrained him with leather straps so that he could not escape them while they prepared the obsidian blades for their work.

* * *

The mare that Elaine had loaned Dean was sure of foot and faster by far than he’d expected a horse to be. She did not tire, not even after galloping flat out for hours and she followed the carriage’s trail unerringly, even when Dean had been sure that they’d lost track of it.

He soon found himself headed for a deep stony pit in the earth, a great dark gouge in the green of Faerie.

The mare slowed her pace as she picked her way down the steep path to the great stone hall at the bottom of the pit, and Dean could only be grateful for the mare’s sure footing, as any misjudged step would have sent them both plummeting to their deaths over the steep cliff.

* * *

Dean approached the stone hall with trepidation. He did not know what he would find within and so creeped to the soot and dust covered windows, careful to stay low to the ground and as much out of sight as he possibly could.

He’d barely had a moment to try to make out anything through the grime covered glass when he felt a knife pressed to the side of his neck. He froze at once, to give whomever had found him no reason to believe that he was going to threaten them, and then very slowly turned his head to see to whom the knife belonged.

“Who are you? What business do you have here?” the man the knife belonged to asked, as Dean appraised him. He was dark-haired and wore fine clothes reminiscent of Primus and, on his hand, he had a large intricate tattoo of the number seven.

Dean took an educated guess at the man’s identity. “Septimus?”

The surprised expression on Septimus’s face told Dean that he’d guessed correctly. “I met your brother, Primus, once.”

“Unless you wish to meet him again in the afterlife, I suggest you answer my question,” Septimus growled lowly, leaning a little closer to Dean in a menacing fashion. “What are you doing here?”

Dean smiled because while Septimus hadn’t been paying attention, Dean had silently drawn his Bowie knife and now pressed it to Septimus’s stomach. “I could ask you the same thing, buddy.” He nodded downward and Septimus followed his gaze to where Dean’s knife was pressed into his navel.

Septimus warily pulled his knife away from Dean’s neck and Dean gratefully returned the favor by removing his knife from Septimus’s stomach, as they both acknowledged the stalemate they’d been in with a nod.

Without saying anything more to one another, they both returned their attention to the grime covered window. Amid the squalor, they could make out three elderly women. Dean spotted Sam and, to his immense surprise and displeasure, the Trickster. Cas was strapped down to a stone table at the far end of the massive room, up a set of stairs.

Dean wasn’t sure why the Trickster was present, and he certainly wasn’t happy to see him clinging to his brother. Dean worried that Sam had been bespelled by the Trickster and could only assume that the Trickster was in league with the witches.

“There’s three witches,” Dean informed Septimus. “The really tall guy there is my brother Sam, and the little dude hanging off his arm is a dangerous trickster god. You should leave him to me.”

Septimus acknowledged this with a nod, as he put his knife back in its sheath. They both crouched out of sight below the window frame. He glanced over at Dean and then commanded, “Do as I say and we may stand a chance.”

Dean looked at him in disbelief. He knew from Primus that Septimus was about as trustworthy as a rabid raccoon, and he certainly didn’t know why this guy thought he could order him around. “And I can trust you because?”

“Do you have a choice?” Septimus pointed out sensibly.

“No, not really,” Dean admitted.

“Well, then, let’s go,” Septimus commanded and jumped to his feet, headed for the great doors that would lead into the hall. Dean gave a mental shrug. If this fool wanted to act as cannon fodder while he got to Sam and Cas, who was Dean to stop him?

Septimus burst into the hall with Dean right behind him. Dean had drawn his gun, presuming that witch killer bullets would be far more effective than trying to behead the witches.

Of course, Septimus’s charge put him right in the way of Dean’s line of fire for every single witch in the room, so Dean instead darted to the side of the room where Sam was crouched on the floor with his arm around the Trickster’s shoulders and where the Trickster had a handful of Sam’s shirt as he leaned into Sam’s side.

Dean grabbed Sam’s arm and pulled him away from the Trickster. Sam resisted for a moment, until he turned to see that the hand on his arm belonged to Dean. Sam’s eyes went wide and he offered no further resistance as Dean tugged him out of sight behind several cages filled with ferrets and wolves. Sam turned to look back at the Trickster, who nearly fell over without Sam propping him up, and who had made a sad and distressed sound at the loss of him.

“Dean?” Sam hissed in surprise, as Dean looked out over the cages in time to see the thinnest witch in a red-and-black dress blast Septimus with a cherry-red conjured flame. Septimus took several steps backward as he flailed in attempt to get away, but he didn’t appear to be dead. At least not yet.

Sam yanked Dean into a crushing hug, which Dean gladly returned. Even though they were both in terrible danger, Dean was overjoyed to know that Sam had survived the weeks alone in Faerie.

“You’re okay,” Sam said, keeping his voice low. “How are you okay? You crossed back to our world. The hellhounds…”

“Didn’t come get my fine ass,” Dean replied cockily. “What the hell is the Trickster doing here?”

“Gabe? I mean, Gabriel,” Sam quickly answered, before hurriedly adding. “Dean, he’s not a proper trickster. He’s a star. Like Castiel. He helped me, after we got separated. And the witches. They mean to kill him after they kill Castiel. And they’ve done something to him. It’s like he’s nearly black-out drunk. I don’t think he knows where he is or what’s going on. We need to get him out of here, too.”

Dean couldn’t quite believe it, but Sam sounded completely sincere about all of that and also supremely distressed at the prospect of leaving behind… Gabriel? That was the Trickster’s real name?

Dean glanced out from their hiding place again. “You should get out of here. Take the Trickster, too, if you gotta, but leave the witches to me and that idiot, Septimus, there.”

Sam shook his head. “I can’t leave Castiel either. And I’m not going to let you go up against these witches alone, jerk.”

* * *

Septimus had lost his saber when the rail-thin witch had turned it red-hot, and she had immediately struck him again with her cherry-red conjured fire. This time he could not quite put it all out, and his leather overcoat smoldered at the shoulders.

She turned away from him to proudly look back at her sisters and gloat, just as Septimus spotted a large sword sitting unattended in a wicker basket next to him. He drew it and heaved it at her with all his might. She heard him grunt with effort and turned in time to see as it slammed into her middle and threw her back into the wall, impaling and pinning her there.

She looked down at her fatal wound, giggled in surprise and pain, and then went limp, still pinned upright by the great sword.

The two witches that had been preparing the blades for their macabre and cannibalistic ritual stopped what they were doing as they witnessed their sister expire at the hands of the prince. The obese witch made an aborted move away from the stone table, but the eldest witch gripped her arm firmly and shook her head.

Septimus picked up his own saber, which was now once again cool to the touch. Warily, he began to cross the hall toward the remaining witches.

Sam and Dean stayed where they were. Dean had shaken his head when Sam had made a move to go and help Septimus. (Dean didn’t much like Septimus and certainly didn’t trust him not to stab him in the back. He’d much rather take his chances against either the witches or Septimus, but not potentially both of them at the same time.)

* * *

The eldest witch drew from a pocket of her dress a small clay poppet, crudely fashioned into the shape of a man. She held it aloft so that it could be clearly seen by Septimus, and she smiled cruelly at him as she gripped its clay arm between her fingers. Viciously she twisted the arm into a ninety-degree angle away from the body.

Septimus howled in pain as his own right arm made a sickening snapping noise and bent at an unnatural angle. His saber flew from his hand as he failed to keep his grip on it through the pain of his right arm breaking. He instinctively tried to stop the pain by grasping at his broken arm with his undamaged hand, but the eldest witch was not yet done with the poppet or with Septimus.

She laughed quietly and then twisted the poppet’s right leg. Septimus’s leg snapped sideways in a way that no leg should, and he instantly collapsed, no longer able to stand.

“Let’s put out those flames, shall we?” the witch mocked Septimus’s smoldering leather overcoat as she let the poppet fall from her grasp into the fountain below her.

Septimus gasped and tried desperately to hold his breath. Impossibly, as the poppet sank, Septimus began to levitate above the stone floor, his hair streaming out around his head as if he was underwater. His struggling motions were reminiscent of a man trying to tread water. Sam looked away as Septimus’s struggles became fainter and fainter and then stopped altogether. When his head lolled back and he was entirely limp, the eldest witch nodded to herself and Septimus’s corpse collapsed to the floor.

Apparently content in eliminating the nuisance of a prince, the remaining witches returned to their work of sharpening the blades.

Sam and Dean exchanged a look. They both nodded, not really needing to speak to know the broad outline of the plan. Dean drew his gun, and Sam’s eyes went wide and alarmed at the sight of it. He shook his head and pushed at Dean’s wrist. Urgently, Sam warned him, “Witch killer bullets don’t work on Fae witches. We’ll need to use blades or weapons from here.”

Dean nodded at that, even though the thought of having to fight these witches with blades did not appeal to him, and he put his gun away. He drew the sword that Jane had given him instead, before handing Sam his Bowie knife. “You’ll go free Cas while I keep these hags busy, okay?”

“Got it,” Sam agreed. “You’ve still got your agate, right?” he asked as an afterthought. “It’ll stop the witches from doing magic on you directly.”

Dean nodded, pulling it from his breast pocket and tying it around his wrist once more. “Right here.”

With that, Dean stepped out from behind the cages and began to stride across the hall. He was careful to not look back and betray what Sam was up to, although he did notice that Gabriel was apparently starting to stir a little as he walked past. It still didn’t look like Gabriel was in any way oriented to where he was or what was going on, so Dean didn’t count on any help coming from that corner, even if he did seem to be coming back to consciousness at least.

“Dean!” Cas called out from the stone table, finally having caught sight of him. A glow burst into life around his head.

The eldest witch frowned at the sight of it.

* * *

Sam kept low and close to the far wall where the animal cages would obscure his presence. He tried to keep a close eye on his brother and tried not to worry about Gabriel. It was clear from the discussion that Sam had overheard the witches having before Dean and Septimus had burst in that they hadn’t intended to harm him immediately, apparently being far more enamored with Castiel’s heart.

“Get him,” Sam heard the eldest of the witches order her obese sister.

Sam froze where he was as he saw the obese witch charge up to the balcony that ran along the second story of the huge room. She ran far faster than anyone would have reasonably expected of a woman of her apparent size and age, and when she was just in front of where Dean was, she leaped from the balcony to the stone floor below with no apparent harm to herself despite how hard she struck the floor.

Dean hesitated rather than charge at her, for which Sam was grateful. If she could do that, there was no telling how strong and durable she would be. Dean glanced around and must have had an epiphany. He struck at the chains that held the cages closed with his sword. The chains broke easily and the ferrets and wolves within the cages sprang free of their prisons. They immediately launched themselves at their long-time tormentor, ripping and tearing at her with tooth and claw.

The witch screamed in agony as the animals tore her apart, and even Dean had to look away from the grisly scene it made.

Once their task was completed, the animals all fled from the hall, paying no mind to the other people that stood between them and the door.

Sam took the distraction for what it was and darted as quickly as he could toward the stairs, stopping when the last and eldest of the witches began to pick her way down the stairs toward Dean.

Sam was immediately deeply worried for his brother and himself. He couldn’t get up the stairs now without her seeing him, and she was clearly the most cunning and dangerous of the three witches. She would not be easily defeated by any cheap trick.

Stopping several strides away from one another, Dean and the witch faced one another down. She was calm and collected, but Sam could see the faint signs of anxiety in how Dean held himself.

The witch spoke, mocking him, “What’s it to be, prince charming, frog… or tadpole?”

Dean did not respond to the taunt, holding his sword in front of him. Yet he flinched and cringed away from the green of her magic as it lashed out toward him. The magic never reached him. Not even when she tried again, jabbing her finger toward him with greater force and more concentration.

Finally presented with evidence of the effectiveness of the agate against this sort of magic, Dean stood tall and smiled smugly as he shook his wrist, showing her the agate charm that hung there.

The witch smiled and nodded in a manner that said, _Yes, that would explain it._

She suddenly did a swift ‘come here’ gesture.

“Look out!” Castiel cried out, seeing the large stone vase that the witch was telekinetically pulling across the room toward Dean.

Dean jumped to one side to avoid it the first time, but when she reversed its direction, it caught him head-on, knocking him to the floor as it shattered around him.

Stunned for a moment, Dean sat aside his sword for a second and reached behind him to retrieve a leather container that looked like a strange cross between a canteen and a quiver. When he popped it open, a bolt of lightning leaped from it, just barely missing the witch. Dean adjusted his aim rapidly before the witch could retaliate, and his second attempt was far more successful, striking the witch in the chest and sending her careening head over heels almost into the fountain.

Sam saw an opening to bolt up the stairs and took it. He dashed up the stairs while the witch was still stunned by the lightning strike and looking the other way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally, this was intended to be one massive chapter combined with the next. However, I thought it was getting a bit long and splitting it here seemed to work.
> 
> (Besides, this was where I ended up stopping writing for an evening and sending an update to WarlockWriter at one point, and I think it is only fitting that everyone else has to experience the same cliffhanger that he did.)
> 
> And one further note: a thank you to those who have left kudos or even the occasional comment. I truly appreciate it!


	20. Starshine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and Dean have finally been reunited, Gabriel is finally coming out of the spell that disabled him and permitted him to be captured, but Castiel is still in grave danger and the last of the witch sisters still lives. Unfortunately, she won't be as easily dealt with as her sisters.

Across the room, Gabriel was beginning to come out of the witch’s spell. He wasn’t perfectly lucid yet and he was still disoriented. He could remember getting ready to smite the witch in the meadow distinctly, but after that everything was a blur. As a matter of fact, everything was still a little blurry, as if his eyes weren’t quite capable of focusing properly.

To his dismay, all his usual options for extrasensory perception seemed to be unavailable to him as well.

Gabriel struggled to sit upright and get himself up off of the cold flagstones he’d been laying on. He appeared to be in a filthy great hall, cluttered with cages that stank of fear and death and filled with artifacts of every description. There was also a fresh corpse of an elderly woman impaled by a large sword pinned to the wall, and the shredded remains of a much larger elderly woman laying on the floor. Following the line of carnage, there was also the body of a finely-dressed man with broken limbs just past the worst of the clutter.

And on the far end of the room, there was Dean Winchester with a sword in hand, facing down the witch that had captured him in the meadow.

The witch was kneeling by a fountain for some reason, and Gabriel was suddenly reminded of the crack of thunder that had woken him from his stupor.

He searched the room for any sign of Sam. Where was he? If Dean was here, Sam would not have fled, and the sound of lightning indoors was not at all reassuring.

Gabriel finally spotted Sam. He’d just dashed up a flight of stairs to a landing where… Was that Castiel strapped down to a stone table? Just what had Gabriel missed while he was out cold?

Still terribly dizzy, Gabriel tried to get to his feet, but he discovered that he still felt oddly disconnected from his vessel and he nearly fell flat on his face.

* * *

Dean approached the witch cautiously. He didn’t think she was truly down for the count, even if the lightning seemed to have hurt her, and he wasn’t going to be surprised if she suddenly turned around and tried to stab him or something.

The sound of metal scraping against stone from behind him was unexpected, though. Dean turned to see what had made the noise. Septimus, impossibly, was getting back to his feet. Except something was very wrong about the picture he made and the way he was moving. His broken leg was still crooked and so was his broken arm, but he stood without any indication of pain. For that matter, his eyes were closed and his head lolled. Something about his movements gave Dean the impression of a puppet suspended on strings.

“Septimus?” Dean questioned, just to be sure.

Septimus raised his saber over his head without answering Dean. It clicked in Dean’s head. The poppet had fallen into the fountain. The same fountain that the witch had been digging around in as Dean had approached her. Clearly whatever magic that had connected it to Septimus in the first place was still in effect, and the witch was now using his corpse exactly like a puppet. If a puppet could wield a saber.

Dean hastily blocked the downward swipe of Septimus’s saber and the next flurry of blows before he saw an opening and slashed his own sword across Septimus’s chest. The corpse flopped over, like some disturbing parody of a deep bow, but still the arm and the saber lashed out blindly. Dean jumped backward to get out of the way, and then found himself dodging a few more strange slashes and lunges from the corpse as it straightened itself again. Dean knocked Septimus’s saber aside as he lunged again, this time running his sword clean through Septimus until the tip of his blade protruded several inches from Septimus’s back.

This did not stop the body from pulling itself off of Dean’s sword and standing up straight once more, the saber almost decapitating Dean as he ducked under the wild swing.

He parried a few more blows before hurriedly sidestepping behind the corpse and slashing clean through Septimus’s spinal column, the body flopping over backward as if it were about to do the limbo.

But even this did not stop the arm and saber from attempting to slash at him. Dean retreated behind a statue. He tried to shove it over and crush the body beneath it, but he misjudged how tall it was, and he missed Septimus with it entirely.

The corpse advanced on him, righting itself and raising the saber above its head.

* * *

While Dean fought the witch-puppeteered corpse of Septimus, Sam rushed to the stone table. Castiel was fighting the leather straps that held him down, but all his efforts were to no avail.

“Sam?” Castiel said quietly, noticing him only once he’d grabbed Castiel’s wrist to try to undo the clasps that held him in place.

Sam nodded to acknowledge that he’d heard Castiel’s quiet question but didn’t otherwise answer him. The longer he could avoid the attention of the witch, the better. Unfortunately, the clasps on the straps would not budge, no matter how Sam tugged on them or tried to loosen them. Deciding that all his hurried fumbling was of no use, Sam produced the Bowie knife that Dean had given to him and began to saw on the straps. But the leather was thick and tough and did not give way easily.

Halfway up the stairs, the witch caught sight of Sam. She lazily raised her hand and sent a blast of her emerald green flame toward his head, careful to not accidentally strike Castiel. Sam knew that the agate would protect him from that and didn’t even flinch as he redoubled his efforts to cut Castiel loose.

As expected, the flames stopped several inches short of reaching Sam, and the witch let loose with a frustrated shriek, recognizing the effects of the charmed agate. A moment later, Sam heard Gabriel’s distressed shout.

Sam didn’t know what Gabriel was concerned about, unless he’d forgotten about the protective agate in his spell-drugged stupor. Of course, that was as far as Sam got in his thoughts before a fiery, piercing pain in his leg screamed to life. Instinctively, Sam reached for the source of the pain, his fingertips finding warm, sticky liquid beginning to soak into his pants and then brushing up against cool metal. Against his better judgement, Sam looked down to see the knife that the witch had telekinetically flung into his thigh. His leg buckled, and he collapsed to the ground.

Somewhere, Gabriel continued to shout.

* * *

Dean heard his brother cry out in pain and knew that something had gone wrong. He glanced around in hopes of another solution to the problem of the witch-puppeteered corpse that was advancing on him implacably with saber raised.

Glancing upward, Dean noticed the ornate chandelier and the rope that held it there, following the rope down, Dean found that it was tied off to a set of metal prongs on the wall behind him, along with two other such ropes. Hurriedly, he sliced through one.

The chandelier above the fountain crashed down, narrowly missing striking Cas as it fell.

Dean briefly took note of Gabriel stumbling toward the stairs behind Septimus as he tried again, slicing through the second rope. This time the chandelier above the stairs crashed down, unfortunately missing the witch herself by about a foot.

The witch turned to look back at the near miss, before manipulating the poppet to raise the saber even higher in preparation to cut Dean down, and then unhurriedly reached the top of the stairs and retrieved one of the obsidian blades. Dean grabbed hold of the final rope and cut it. The chandelier crashed downward right on top of Septimus’s corpse as the rope yanked Dean off his feet upward. He swung toward the landing and over the stone table to crash into the witch, knocking both of them off their feet and away from his injured brother and the captive Castiel.

* * *

The witch and Dean both collapsed to the ground. Sam held his injured leg and tried to slow down the bleeding as Gabe scrambled up the stairs at last and then over to him. He appeared to still be a tiny bit unsteady, but he did look aware.

“Gabe!” Sam couldn’t help but say, trying to smile but probably grimacing instead.

“Sam,” Gabe replied, frantically reaching out, first grasping at Sam’s shoulders as if he meant to embrace him, and then gasping at the sight of the knife that was still buried in Sam’s thigh. He made an aborted movement toward grasping the knife to pull it out, but then instantly thought better of it. Removing the knife would only cause Sam to bleed out even faster and they both knew it.

Gabe glanced toward Dean and the witch and then made a decision. He grabbed hold of Sam and began half dragging, half carrying him away from the witch and toward the stairs.

“Castiel,” Sam reminded him through gritted teeth.

“Dean’s got him,” Gabe shot right back.

Dean had gotten back to his feet. He was quick to look over to check how Sam was doing, and Sam tried to communicate with just a nod that he was all right for now and that he should look after Castiel. Dean understood and ran to Castiel’s side.

* * *

Dean rushed to Cas’s side and tugged on the straps that were holding him to the stone table. He’d have to trust that Gabriel was getting Sam to safety, as Sam clearly thought that he was.

He had only enough time to uselessly tug at the straps a couple of times before Cas’s shout had him turning to see what was happening.

The witch had gotten to her feet and snatched up both of her obsidian knives – one a monstrous meat cleaver and the other a long, curved boning knife. Dean raised his sword hastily to ward off her flurry of blows, trying desperately to keep her away from Cas and from Sam and Gabriel. But she was furious and ferocious as she dual-wielded her knives with skill that only great age and centuries of practice could grant. Dean was no match for her and was soon disarmed, his sword skittering across the stone, landing well out of reach.

He backed away from her, placing himself between her and Cas. She pressed the flat tip of the cleaver to his throat as she panted with effort. An endless second passed as she observed the remnants of the carnage that had been visited upon her home and the individuals that were responsible for it. And then she raised her cleaver to strike.

Dean closed his eyes and heard Castiel cry out and Sam shout as the knife was brought down toward his unguarded neck and chest.

Unexpectedly, Dean didn’t feel the cleaver slice deep into his flesh, and when far longer than he’d anticipated passed without the agonizing feeling of his chest being torn open materializing, he warily opened his eyes.

The witch still stood before him, glaring at him with unmitigated hatred in her eyes. She threw down her knives with a clatter to the floor and Dean glanced to his side as the leather strap holding down Cas slid off the table to the floor, neatly severed by the witch’s strike.

“Youth. Beauty,” the witch moaned, her voice wobbling as she fought back tears. “It all seems so meaningless now. My sisters are dead! Everything I cared about is gone!”

She turned away from them all, sobbing. “Go.”

Dean struggled to believe his luck and the witch’s last moment change of heart, but he hurried to finish freeing Cas from the remaining leather straps that still held him down. This time the latches and clasps came free easily.

Gabriel, meanwhile, had helped Sam to get to his feet by letting Sam lean heavily on him to avoid putting any weight on his still injured leg, and they had already nearly made it to the bottom of the stairs.

“Go!” the witch shouted again.

The four of them made for the door at the far end of the hall as quickly as they could, with Dean and Cas catching up to Sam and Gabriel easily. Dean hurriedly threw an arm around Sam’s back to help Gabriel support him, and they all walked and hobbled toward their freedom.

They were only a handful of strides from the door when it slammed shut on them, the witch’s sobs turning to delighted cackling. Great metal shutters fell across the windows, preventing any escape from the hall.

The mirrors that lined the walls on either side of the hall began to vibrate. The set nearest to the doors exploded into shards which rained toward them. They all jumped backward and covered their heads, trying to keep the shards and splinters of glass from slicing them.

Injured, Sam covered his face as best he could and tried to hobble away from the rain of sharp glass. Gabriel did his best to protect Sam and keep him from falling as they tried to stay ahead of the exploding mirrors, as the witch sequentially shattered them, herding them back toward her.

Sam and Gabriel were only barely able to keep up with Dean and Cas.

At last there were no more mirrors for the witch to break, and the four of them found themselves kneeling with their arms over their heads nearly back at the fountain beneath the stairs.

The witch knelt and picked up the great obsidian cleaver and slowly descended the stairs.

“I owe you thanks, boy,” she addressed Dean with a chuckle. “What use was his heart to me when it was broken. It was bad enough that the other one has done something to himself that makes his heart absolutely useless to me. And you _also_ got rid of my sisters so I can have it all to myself.”

This appeared to be the end. The witch had them trapped and Dean had lost his sword. He could draw his gun and riddle her with bullets, but Sam had been certain that doing so would accomplish nothing. Sam still had the Bowie knife, but he was hurt and couldn’t run. If Gabriel had any useful powers, he didn’t appear to be able to use them at the moment.

Dean stepped in front of Cas and Sam. If they were all going to die, Dean was at least not going to watch them die in front of him.

Cas had other ideas. He grabbed Dean’s arm and pulled him toward himself, turning Dean so that they were facing one another.

“Hold me tight,” Cas commanded before glancing over toward Gabriel. “Brother, you must protect Sam.”

“What? Why?” Dean asked, confused as to what Cas could possibly have in mind.

“What do stars do?” Cas asked one last time, his lips twitching with a barely suppressed grin, as he hugged Dean tightly, finally whispering the answer into his ear: “Shine.”

* * *

Gabe’s eyes went wide at Castiel’s command. He huddled close to Sam, who had collapsed back onto the floor while trying to avoid the exploding mirrors and the flying shards of glass.

“Close your eyes, Sam,” Gabe warned, wrapping his arms around Sam’s shoulders and gently pressing his hand to the back of Sam’s head, silently indicating that he wanted Sam to hide his face in Gabe’s shoulder. Sam returned the embrace as best he could without jostling his leg, as he did what Gabe asked, and then heard something rustle around him.

“Castiel’s about to get real bright,” Gabe muttered lowly, as Sam felt something press against his back… were those feathers?

* * *

Dean didn’t close his eyes immediately, but the glow that had often accompanied Cas had suddenly reappeared, growing exponentially brighter with every passing second until Dean closed his eyes for fear that they’d burn out of his head if he did not. Even through his eyelids, the light was blinding.

He heard the witch scream in horror and felt something like a burst of energy emanate from Cas, and then – at last – the blinding light began to dim again.

When the light had faded away, Dean let go of Cas and looked around the room.

Where the witch had been standing, only bits of floating ash remained.

Sam and Gabriel appeared to be all right, although to Dean’s incredulous surprise, Gabriel was just now relaxing massive golden _wings_ that he’d wrapped around Sam.

Sam was looking just as surprised, even as he hadn’t quite let go of Gabriel’s shoulders, glancing from the wings to Gabriel and back again a few times. His jaw was working but no sound was coming out.

* * *

Sam couldn’t believe his eyes. The final piece of the puzzle clicked into place.

The reason Castiel’s name sounded familiar, the reason that the name Gabriel was associated with Castiel and with the number four.

Castiel was the name of an angel, one that Sam had invoked in a ritual once.

Gabriel was the name of one of the _**four**_ archangels.

Castiel had said that Gabriel was a greater, more powerful kind of star. Archangels were the eldest and most powerful of the angels.

And Gabriel had wings. Huge golden wings that were still half mantling Sam as Gabriel gave him an apologetic smile.

The Archangel Gabriel had just protected Sam and was now waiting for Sam to respond to the revelation and was looking increasingly worried when Sam couldn’t find any words at all.

“You okay there, kiddo?” Gabriel finally asked, folding his wings until they vanished into thin air as if they’d never been at all.

“Stars are angels?” Sam finally stated, stunned and starstruck. “You’re Gabriel. The Archangel Gabriel.”

“Guilty,” Gabe admitted. “On all counts.”

He looked down at Sam’s injured leg. “I’m also an idiot.”

“Huh?” Sam wasn’t following that at all.

“Wasn’t thinking all that clearly,” Gabe clarified. “Will you permit me to heal you?”

Sam nodded, “Yeah, sure. Of course.”

Gabe touched Sam’s leg, just above the injury. White light not unlike what had just bathed the entire hall now illuminated Gabe’s palm, and the knife worked its own way out of the wound, leaving behind unbroken skin and no pain whatsoever.

Sam could only sit there, still utterly stunned. Still trying to work out how it could possibly be that Gabe was really _Gabriel_. The two concepts didn’t seem to want to mesh in Sam’s mind.

Distantly, he heard Dean ask Castiel, “How come you didn’t do that earlier?”

To which Castiel replied plainly, “No star can shine with a broken heart. Not in Faerie. I could never have done that without you here. I’d thought I had lost you. I thought you had gone to die. But you came back. You are all right.”

“Of course I came back for you, Cas,” Dean replied. “I- I love you, all right? I’d never abandon you to get your heart ripped out. Even if I had to claw my way out of Hell to do it.”

Sam had to admit that he hadn’t seen _that_ coming. Although there was no doubt in his mind, once he thought about it for a moment, that Dean and Castiel would be good for one another. And the way Castiel was glowing as he stared at Dean as Dean had confessed that…

Sam thought about how Gabe had glimmered and glowed in a similar fashion and then he spent a few moments considering precisely _when_ Gabe had glimmered. It had always been when Sam had trusted him, or when Sam had been more affectionate and friendly than normal.

Sam briefly considered that he might be smote just like the witch for even thinking about it, but the way that Gabe was watching him just now, a little vulnerable and a lot unsure, Sam figured he probably wasn’t too far off the mark.

Sam pressed a quick kiss to Gabe’s mouth, little more than a quick peck.

Gabe’s eyes were wide with surprise when Sam pulled back, but there was a very obvious glow around him.

Sam smiled at the evidence that Gabe was pleased with the kiss.

“What was that for?” Gabe asked, sounding ever so slightly wary.

Sam shrugged, trying to not be concerned that he’d read this all wrong. “I wanted to?”

“Oh,” said Gabe, sounding ever so slightly disappointed.

Sam didn’t understand that reaction for a second, and then it dawned on him that maybe he should clarify that he’d also wanted to kiss him _before_ he’d known Gabe was an angel. “I mean, I kinda wanted to for a while now. I just hadn’t fully put everything together until I saw Dean and Castiel.”

“Oh!” Gabe repeated, still lost for words, but this time smiling widely and pulling Sam into another hug.

* * *

Dean looked over to see the way Gabriel was clinging to Sam. Surprisingly, Sam looked the happiest Dean had seen him since Jess. What’s more, Gabriel was glowing in the exact same way that Cas was.

That was going to take some getting used to. As was the sneaking suspicion that maybe Gabriel and Castiel’s species might be called something else in the human world. Something that Dean had been sure didn’t exist and only now was beginning to think might.

“Hey!” Dean called over at them, deciding to worry about the concept of angels later, and they sprang apart, looking a little shy and awkward. Dean considered teasing them for just a moment but decided that now probably wasn’t the time. Instead he asked, “Do either of you know why Elaine wanted me to give a message to Loki?”

“That’ll be for me,” Gabriel admitted, somehow managing to increase and decrease Dean’s confusion at the same time. “What’d she want?”

“Said she was going to need some help with a project. Something about a construct?”

Gabriel rolled his eyes as he helped Sam to his feet. “I guess that answers the question of whether or not she knew what Castiel really was. Probably knows what I am, too. Ain’t that just peachy.”

Cas gripped Dean’s hand tightly. “You spoke with Elaine? What did she have to say about your contract?”

“Ah,” Dean tried to recall what she’d said. “Not much, I don’t think. She implied that she didn’t need to do anything. Like the problem had already been solved, or something.”

He glanced at Cas and noticed that something was missing. The golden necklace that Cas had never once taken off in all the time Dean had known him was gone.

Dean scanned the room and noticed the shattered remains of the necklace and the unharmed gemstone laying on the floor nearby. He trotted over and picked up the stone.

* * *

_For a brief moment, the whole realm of Faerie seemed to hold its breath as Dean picked up the royal ruby of the Stormhold dynasty. There was an air of expectation._

_Yet nothing happened at all. The gem remained inert and colorless in the palm of Dean’s hand. _

_The moment passed._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At last, we've wrapped up the biggest troubles of the story, and I've finally officially "revealed" that stars are just what the Fae happen to call the beings that humans know as angels. I know that some of you may have caught on to that a while ago, but I do hope that I've pleasantly surprised a few of you and you can now look back and enjoy the various bits of foreshadowing I've littered throughout the story.
> 
> There is one final chapter which straddles the line between ending and epilogue. There are some odds and ends that need to be tidied up and I will be doing so there.
> 
> Unlike every other chapter, the last chapter is also the only chapter that I was thoroughly displeased with in my original version, and therefore it was the only chapter that needed significant revision. Which also means that it is possible that I may not upload the final chapter quite when I'd hoped to, as I have very limited time and energy at the moment. However, I beg your patience as I expand and edit so I can give you even more content. The final chapter's original word count stood at ~3,300 words, but the expanded version that I'm currently working on as of this moment is standing at approximately 6,000 words with at least two planned scenes completely unwritten. (It also is giving me the opportunity to slip in a few details that may be useful to me if I should try to write a sequel.)


	21. The Vessel and the Stormhold Heir

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Elaine proves herself to be a very useful ally indeed, and several potential complications are dealt with unusually easily.

Once outside of the witches’ fortress, Dean retrieved the mare that Elaine had loaned him, while Sam and Gabriel and Castiel busied themselves with unhooking the four black stallions from the carriage. When this task was complete, Gabriel had snapped his fingers to manifest tack better suited for riding the stallions, and soon the four of them were on their way back to the Wall.

On the way, Dean told Sam about his adventures with the lightning pirates, dispelling many of Sam’s concerns about what had happened to Dean and Castiel while they’d been separated. In return, Sam told Dean about travelling through the swamp with Gabriel and their encounter with the lindorm.

The four of them reached the Wall by early evening.

* * *

Upon reaching the Wall, Dean started to lead his mare over the gap. Panicked, Sam grabbed him by the wrist. “What are you doing?”

“Gonna go find Elaine and see what she’s got planned,” Dean answered, sounding slightly miffed that Sam was acting so squirrely. It wasn’t as if Dean hadn’t already crossed over into Witch’s Wood once today without running into any trouble.

Sam shook his head, “No way. You might have just gotten lucky the last time you crossed the gap. I should go instead.”

Gabriel nodded at that, “I agree with Sam. There’s no telling if there will be hellhounds waiting for you this time. Sam and I should go and see what Elaine is up to…”

Sam turned to glare at Gabriel. “Is it even safe for you to cross the Wall?”

“Sure it is!” Gabriel answered. “I’m in a vessel. Not whatever weird Fae-magic construct Castiel’s got going on right now.”

Sam made a mental note to ask Gabriel what a vessel was and how that made it possible for him to walk around in the human world when Castiel couldn’t cross the Wall at all.

Dean interrupted. “Even if you can cross the Wall, we’re still not one-hundred percent sure that this hasn’t been all one long con to get rid of her competitors and take both of your hearts for herself. You shouldn’t be getting too close to her, either.”

At this point, a familiar female voice interrupted their debate from just across the Wall. “Really? Are you all still worried about that?”

Elaine was just cresting the river bank with a blue jay perched on her arm. “It’s good to see that you all made it at any rate.” She then eyed an empty part of the meadow and amended her previous statement. “Well, most of you.”

Dean eyed her warily, stepping in front of Castiel with his hand resting on his gun, while Sam put himself between her and Gabriel. “What do you mean by that?” Dean asked.

“She’s talking about the ghosts that followed us from the witches’ fortress,” Gabriel remarked offhandedly. “It looks like this particular misadventure just ended the entire royal line of Stormhold.”

Elaine nodded in agreement with what Gabriel had said but was otherwise too busy tying a small note to the blue jay’s leg to reply.

Castiel pushed past Dean’s protective stance, stepping forward to demand the one answer that he really wanted from Elaine: “What do you need from me in order to save him?”

Elaine looked up from her work, releasing the bird into the sky through the gap. “It seems that you’ve already done it. _‘He who possesses the heart of a star will live forever’,_ or so the story goes, and unless I very much miss my guess, it would appear that Dean is already in possession of yours. After a fashion.”

Castiel relaxed at that pronouncement, leaning a little into Dean, who wrapped an arm around Castiel’s back unthinkingly.

“And if Castiel hadn’t fallen for Dean?” Gabriel asked. “That seems like a big gamble to have made. Angels don’t fall in love terribly often. What would you have done if that hadn’t happened?”

Elaine shrugged. “I believe that it would have been possible to construct a similar effect, even without any feelings involved, so long as Castiel had been willing to help. I had always hoped that he’d be willing to volunteer to help. I truly wasn’t planning on killing anyone. Unless the star that had fallen had turned out to be Zachariah, or maybe Metatron, in which case I would have been sorely tempted to.”

Gabriel thought about that for a moment before reluctantly nodding in agreement with her. It appeared that Zachariah and Metatron were not well liked even among their own kind.

“I presume that you’d like to be able to cross the Wall and join Dean in his life here, now that he’s no longer in danger of hellhounds, Castiel,” Elaine continued. “Given all that’s happened, I suspect that you’d no longer be welcome in Heaven.”

Castiel shook his head, “I would not be welcome in Heaven, no. You are correct in that. And I would very much wish to follow Dean across the Wall. To stay with him.”

“I thought you might,” Elaine said with a gentle smile. “I had already begun to put together a vessel construct suitable for the human world, but I’m going to need some help with it. Would you mind aiding me, Gabriel?”

Gabriel grinned his most mischievous smile. “Me? Help a seraph flee from Heaven’s bullshit? I would be more than happy to help you with that!”

“Wonderful!” Elaine said, clapping her hands together happily.

Gabriel shook his head slightly. “But even with my help, it’s gonna take some time to prepare a constructed vessel. Probably a week or two. Castiel is gonna have to stay in Faerie until we finish with it.”

“I’m not going to leave Cas alone over here,” Dean said firmly.

“No one was saying that you had to,” Elaine pointed out. “If you’re in need of more money for an inn, I can provide that for the two of you.”

Sam looked between Gabriel and Dean. It was clear that Dean would be staying in Faerie with Castiel, at least until it was possible for Castiel to cross the Wall, and it was equally clear that Gabriel would need to spend plenty of time in Witch’s Wood to collaborate with Elaine.

On the one hand, Sam didn’t want to be separated from Dean after spending all that time searching for him and only just being reunited with him. On the other hand, Sam didn’t want to be separated from Gabriel until they could actually talk about everything that had happened between them in the last handful of hours – and he probably didn’t want to stay too close to his brother and Castiel. He was pretty sure that he’d overhear things he didn’t want to know about the both of them if he did.

Elaine had produced another pouch full of coins for Dean while Sam was considering what to do, and she was discussing the finer points of the ritual that she’d already started to prepare ahead of meeting with Gabriel. It appeared that she’d done a relatively good job of guessing what she’d need, but Gabriel was suggesting some higher quality spell ingredients and a few modifications to the actual ritual.

“Of course,” she said, turning to face Sam, “you and Gabriel are most welcome in Witch’s Wood. I have a second cabin that you can borrow, if you want. I don’t wish to presume anything, but I suspect that some distance would be best for all of us, seeing as I’ve never had a reason to soundproof my guest rooms in my main house.”

Sam already knew that he was going to take her up on this offer, having decided that Dean and Castiel would be safe enough in Market, but he blushed scarlet at the implication she appeared to be making. He didn’t even know if that was something that Gabriel would be interested in. It seemed like Gabe – the being that had impersonated a pagan god for years and years – would be, but that didn’t mesh very well with Sam’s mental image of how angels behaved.

* * *

What actually happened that night in Elaine’s guest cabin was exactly as loud as Elaine had feared it to be, but what happened wasn’t what Sam had blushed about either.

After Elaine had shown them around the tiny cabin, which was nestled deep in the forest about a quarter mile inland from Lake Superior, she’d bid them good evening and left them to their own devices.

Gabriel immediately took up residence on the sofa with his feet propped up on the coffee table. Sam nervously looped around the main room before sitting down across from Gabriel in a comfortable leather chair. He didn’t know where to start asking his questions. He knew he needed to ask what Gabriel wanted from him. If he wanted to stick around, or if he was just interested in a short-term thing. Because Sam couldn’t help but doubt that he was really worthy of the love of an archangel. Especially given how he was contaminated by the blood of a demon, a painful thought that had only just occurred to him.

“I can hear your angst from all the way over here,” Gabriel said.

“Sorry,” Sam said immediately, in a knee-jerk reaction. “I didn’t mean…”

Gabriel frowned. “I didn’t mean it like that. You don’t need to apologize. I just… I don’t know how to… I mean… All the self-doubt is unnecessary.”

“Are you reading my mind?” Sam asked, trying to not get upset about it but worrying that Gabriel had been doing just that and feeling a little uncomfortably vulnerable if that was truly the case.

“No!” Gabriel shouted. “Of course I’m not. I mean… I could. If I wanted to. But I do know that humans really value the privacy of their thoughts. I won’t do that if I can avoid it. I promise.”

“Oh.” That was all Sam could say to that.

They sat in uncomfortable silence for a little while after that, before Sam came to a decision. He braced himself for this to go wrong, because even though Gabriel had said the self-doubt wasn’t necessary, Sam was still uncertain of what precisely Gabriel wanted from him. Still, he got to his feet and crossed the room to sit on the sofa with Gabriel.

Gabriel grinned as he sat down and tentatively wrapped an arm around his shoulders. He relaxed into Sam’s side with a pleased sigh, and Sam felt some of the nervous tension he hadn’t realized he’d been feeling drain out of him. Gabriel didn’t mind him being nearby, or even cuddling up to him. That was a relief.

Sam and Gabriel sat like that, both happy and content, for a little while as Sam absently ran his fingers through Gabriel’s hair.

Then Sam felt Gabriel grow increasingly tense. That seemed like a bad sign.

“Sam?”

Sam hmmed in acknowledgement.

“I need to tell you something,” Gabriel began, and Sam didn’t like how hesitant and uncomfortable Gabriel sounded.

“Okay?” Sam said, knowing he sounded a little worried too.

“It’s about you and your brother,” Gabriel continued, pulling himself away from Sam and standing up to pace around the room.

Sam leaned forward and watched him intently feeling very, very worried. “What about Dean and me?”

“A lot of things about the two of you, really,” Gabriel said, still sounding very hesitant and uncomfortable as he paced in clear anxiety.

Sam wanted to ask, but that sounded terribly ominous and, from how Gabriel was acting, he didn’t think that he’d get anywhere by pressing him too hard.

“You know what happened to you the night your mother died, right?” Gabriel suddenly asked, stopping his pacing to look at Sam with utter seriousness.

Sam swallowed around a sudden lump in his throat as he choked out what Gabriel was clearly alluding to: “The demon blood that Yellow-Eyes fed me.”

Gabriel nodded. “Yes, that. I thought you might know about it.”

Sam nodded, but was sure he couldn’t speak even if he wanted to. That Gabriel was bringing that up couldn’t possibly mean anything good. It confirmed that he knew about it, for one, and surely an angel – an archangel – wouldn’t really want to have anything to do with someone so thoroughly hell-touched, would he?

“It’s about why that happened. And why Azazel, that’s the entity you knew as Yellow-Eyes, made the deal he did with your father. And why Dean’s deal was so short. That’s what I need to tell you about,” Gabriel said, all in a big rush.

Sam shook his head. Wanting to talk about the demon blood made sense, but the rest… he wasn’t sure how that all fit together. The confusion must have shown on his face, because Gabriel was quick to continue explaining, as he nervously ran his fingers through his hair.

“It was all part of a plan, you see,” Gabriel said.

“The Boy King of Hell,” Sam said bitterly, predicting what Gabriel might be about to say. About how horribly Sam had been tainted, and how he’d cursed his own family.

“Ah… that’s part of it, I suppose,” Gabriel admitted, looking a little lost now. “But that’s not really all of it.”

Sam braced himself for something worse.

“It was all about the Apocalypse,” Gabriel finally burst out, looking pained to even have to say it.

Whatever Sam had been bracing himself for, that was not it. He’d known that the demons were up to no good, but the Apocalypse. The end of the world. That was beyond what he’d guessed, and his heart lurched uncomfortably as he suspected what his role was likely to have been.

“See, there’s only a very select set of circumstances in which the Apocalypse can happen. First you’ve got to get the right people to exist, for one, with the right bloodlines. Your dad comes from one of those bloodlines and your mother from the other, because there had to be a set of brothers for this whole thing to be properly poetic, and I suppose that’s a condition of prophecies really…” Gabriel shook his head. “I guess the symbolism isn’t really all that important.”

“What was supposed to happen was you needed to be inoculated with demon blood early on, because if you weren’t it’d be terribly toxic, but you can become tolerant to it if it’s introduced early enough – horrible as that is. And that’s why Azazel did what he did. That’ll be important in a moment. Anyway, from there, you need a righteous man – ideally one from a very specific bloodline – to sell his soul to hell for unselfish reasons, and once he got there to spill innocent blood. Your dad would have fulfilled that requirement, except that he managed to escape before he did it. At least, that’s what I’d heard through the grapevine.”

Sam wasn’t sure what all of this was leading up to, but he felt a flare of pride for his father. The stubborn old bastard had gotten the better of hell and, even though Sam had rarely seen eye-to-eye with him, Sam still couldn’t help but love him and could only be glad that his dad had managed what he had.

“So, of course, Hell needed another righteous man. And along comes your brother wanting to make practically the same deal as your dad had. Which is why they haggled him down to only a year. They wanted him as soon as possible, and they knew he was desperate enough to take the deal.”

“What would have happened if Dean had gone to hell?” Sam finally asked. “If he’d… if he’d tortured someone?” It was difficult for Sam to imagine his brother ever hurting an innocent, let alone torturing someone, but he needed to know where Gabriel was going with this.

“It would have broken a… I suppose you could call it a Seal. The first seal. On a cage…” Gabriel trailed off, as if daunted by something.

Sam didn’t want to ask, but he knew he had to. “What’s in this cage?”

Gabriel shook his head. “My brother. The Devil. Lucifer. There’s more seals than just that one, a lot more, but only sixty-six would have needed to have been broken. And the last one, the last one would have been you killing Lilith.”

Sam winced. He’d heard of Lilith, even had some inkling that she might have something to do with Dean’s contract and had that been confirmed… Sam knew he would have stopped at nothing to kill her, especially in the event that Dean had died and gone to Hell. He was reminded all too painfully of his behavior during the six months that didn’t really happen after Dean’s final death at the Mystery Spot. The full context of Gabriel’s actions there and the lesson he had clearly meant for Sam to learn now seemed plain.

“I was meant to let Lucifer free,” Sam muttered, pained by what could have happened. “I would have…”

Gabriel nodded gravely. “There’s more. You see, angels don’t have physical bodies anymore than demons do. We have to possess people, generally speaking. Although unlike demons we have to get their consent first.”

Sam was too numb to properly react. He had a dull sense of what Gabriel was going to say, and he knew it was going to hurt.

“Anyway, for the Apocalypse to go down, my brother Michael was going to need his true vessel and Lucifer was going to need his. And this is where the demon blood and the poetic bit of the prophecy comes into play. See, your dad was part of Michael’s vessel line. Your mom was a descendent of Lucifer’s vessel line. I’m honestly not so sure that Heaven didn’t meddle to make sure they got together. Guess that doesn’t really matter that much. What’s important is that you and Dean are Lucifer’s and Michael’s true vessels, respectively. Which brings me back around to the demon blood. In order to house Lucifer, you’ve got to drink that shit. And lots of it. Or else he’ll burn right through you. So… that’s why the demon blood was a thing. Also so you could kill Lilith, but that’s another story.”

Sam sat there numbly. His entire life. All of it had been meant to prepare him to be the Devil’s meatsuit, to let the Devil try to destroy the world.

“Sam?”

Sam stood. This was all too much. He needed… he needed to get out of here. Away from Gabriel. Away from all these horrible revelations about all the terrible things he was meant to be responsible for. All the reasons that Gabriel shouldn’t even want to be in the same room as him, let alone touch him.

Sam wanted to shout at Gabriel to leave him alone, to be angry that he’d told him what he had, to be angry that he hadn’t told him at any point before now, that he hadn’t intervened when they’d first met or when he’d tortured Sam with the time loop he now understood the purpose of.

Instead the door slammed behind him and he found himself outside of the cabin and halfway across the lawn before he could say anything he would regret.

The forest surrounded him on all sides and all that painful energy drove him to just keep walking. He was surprised that Gabriel did not follow him, even though he heard Gabriel call for him several times as he left the yard.

Sam walked for what felt like a few miles, as he stewed in his frustration and emotional turmoil over what Gabriel had told him, as he traced a broad loop around the cabin through the old-growth forest.

He’d just started to come to the conclusion that even though he was still upset that Gabriel hadn’t taken any of the earlier opportunities he’d had to intervene in a less circuitous and painful manner, being informed about what Heaven and Hell had planned for Dean and him could only be a good thing. Especially if it kept them from accidentally bringing about the Apocalypse. He had just stopped for a few moments to wipe the tears that had been leaking down his face when he noticed the wolf. It was large and cream-colored, and it was standing in the middle of the trail he’d stumbled across, staring at him.

Sam wasn’t armed and he was sure that the wrong choice would be to run. That would make him seem like prey and he was sure the wolf would chase him down. It didn’t seem threatening or aggressive, however. It was just standing there, observing him.

It then laid down in the middle of the trail, completely at ease with him standing there.

Sam got the impression that he wasn’t permitted to go any further down this trail, he took a step backwards and then another, trying not to let the wolf out of his sight.

It got to its feet, stretched a little, and then began to pace off into the woods, keeping him in sight.

That was more than a little unnerving.

He turned as much as he dared and started heading back the way he had come from, keeping the wolf visible in the corner of his eye. The wolf paced along and it finally occurred to Sam that it almost appeared to be escorting him. It certainly wasn’t behaving as if it wished to eat him.

That was also disconcerting but perhaps less so than the idea of becoming a wild animal’s meal.

Gabriel was waiting for him when he arrived back at the cabin.

All of his frustration burst out of Sam without it really meaning to: “Why didn’t you just tell us all of that before?!”

Gabriel looked contrite as he answered, “I was – I am – scared of my brothers, all right! I know I seem incomprehensibly powerful to you, but I’m not nearly as powerful as Michael and Raphael and all the rest of the hosts of Heaven backing the two of them up. I’m just me!”

“If you’d told me why I couldn’t go after Lilith…” Sam snapped.

“I was a pagan god to you. I was a _trickster!_ You never would have taken me at my word,” Gabriel yelled, before shaking his head and saying more calmly, “I’m sorry I went about it the way I did. I wish I would have been brave enough to just give you proof of what I was and tell you what was going on, but I wasn’t and I couldn’t think of any other way to try to convince you that revenge quests were going to get you and literally everyone else killed.”

Sam stood there, silently. He was tainted with demon blood, prophesized to free Lucifer and then to agree be the meatsuit of the devil himself, and now that all his frustration had drained away with the realization that Gabriel had been scared and desperate, all that was left was the ache in his heart that with the knowledge of all that was against him, there really wasn’t much hope that what had happened in Faerie meant anything that Sam had wanted it to. (How could he have let himself forget about the demon blood? Well… actually, that was easy enough to answer. It hadn’t seemed relevant when Gabe was just a trickster. And then the truth had come out so suddenly and it wasn’t until just now that he’d had enough time to really think about it all.)

They both stood there in silence for a little while.

Sam eventually took a deep steadying breath. “You’re right. I wouldn’t have believed any of that. Not without evidence.”

Gabriel nodded.

“I suppose once you get everything sorted around with Castiel, you’ll want to go back to hiding?” Sam asked quietly. “That you’ll want to go back to your old life?” _Without me._ Sam didn’t add.

Gabriel seemed to pick up on Sam’s odd tone, because he frowned and his brows crunched up slightly in confusion. “I don’t exactly intend to advertise that I’m an archangel, no. I’d definitely prefer if we keep the whole Loki charade going for as long as possible. Like I said, I can’t really hope to fight all my brothers single-handedly.”

Sam hung his head tiredly. He’d expected that response but it didn’t hurt any less.

“Sam?” Gabriel questioned. “I didn’t… I don’t understand why that’s upsetting? I really can’t safely go around announcing to everyone we meet that I’m an archangel, that’s all.”

Sam snorted a little bitterly, “After everything that I was supposed to be responsible for, after being infected by demon blood… are you really going to want to stick around?”

Gabriel actually burst out laughing at this, much to Sam’s surprise and annoyance.

“Is that what’s got you so upset? That tiny little drop of demon blood is no big deal. It might become a problem if you consumed lots more, but you haven’t. And all the rest… it was just a possibility, not something you’ve done.” Gabriel shook his head. “In case it isn’t obvious, I’m not intending to flit off and not come back. I’d like to stick around… if you don’t mind, that is.” This last was said with a tiny bit of doubt, as if Gabriel had suddenly realized that it might be possible that Sam didn’t want Gabriel to stick around after Castiel’s new vessel was finished.

Sam was quick to correct any misconception on that point before it could fester: “Of course I’d like you to stick around!” Sam stared at his own feet for a moment, “I’d like that a lot, actually.”

“Good!” Gabriel said, suddenly tugging on Sam’s arm. “So why don’t we head on inside and resume taking advantage of Elaine’s hospitality?”

Sam nodded, following Gabriel into the cabin. “Is there anything else we should be concerned about first? About the Apocalypse and the various factions trying to bring it about?”

Gabriel paused in the middle of the room and considered for a few moments. “I think you’re in pretty good shape for the moment. Castiel’s devotion to your brother canceled out Dean’s contract, so Hell is going to have a hell of a time fulfilling the requirements to break the first seal on Lucifer’s cage without him. You can’t have the Apocalypse without Lucifer, and you can’t open the Cage without that first seal breaking. So unless they can find another righteous man to sell his soul – which is easier said than done – I think the Apocalypse is dead in the water. At least for right now.”

Sam nodded, pleased to hear that.

“Heaven and Hell won’t give up, though,” Gabriel added darkly. “I wouldn’t put it past them to not have some idea of what happened to throw the whole plan into the trash. It’s quite possible that they may try to take revenge on everyone involved in this misadventure, especially me and Castiel.”

“And Elaine?” Sam asked, sure that the witch who had started this all would be the easiest target for the forces of heaven and hell.

Gabriel shrugged. “Maybe. I’d say yes, if it weren’t for the fact that the wards around this place are impossibly strong. I’m not even sure that Heaven and Hell can even tell what goes on in this place, and even if they can… these wards might be able to hold off anything less than Michael himself. At least, I can’t imagine that there are any wards that can keep Michael out. I don’t think that they’d be able to…”

Sam got the impression that Gabriel wasn’t actually sure at all about how powerful the wards around Witch’s Wood really were, and he could tell that this was unnerving for him. The notion of wards powerful enough to repel an assault by an archangel did raise an awful lot of questions. The biggest two of which that Sam could think of were: _How could a witch create wards powerful enough to stop the second most powerful entity in the universe?_ and _If Elaine didn’t create them – because a witch couldn’t – what had?_

* * *

Meanwhile, in Market, Dean and Castiel did not discuss the plots and plans of Heaven and Hell. Instead, they indulged in what could easily have been mistaken by the inn’s other guests as a very passionate honeymoon.

* * *

Dean was already dressed when he woke Cas. The previous evening had been celebratory – given their improbable survival. It certainly hadn’t felt like the time to quiz Cas about… well, about what he really was.

Dean didn’t believe in angels. He never had. Sam did, which would have raised questions about the Trickster claiming to be an archangel if it hadn’t been for Cas easily claiming him as his brother. Dean may not have believed in angels, but he also didn’t believe that Cas would lie to him. Which meant that Cas and the Trickster were the same species. Which implied that either Cas was a trickster – and that was clearly an absurd thought – or that the being Dean had known as the Trickster wasn’t actually a trickster at all. Dean couldn’t quite bring himself to believe that Cas and the Trickster – Gabriel – were angels. Even if the wings he’d seen wrapped around his brother were pretty conclusive.

He’d really need to ask Cas.

That was one reason for waking him.

The other reason was because Dean really wanted to go across the Wall and talk with Sam. Dean wanted to make sure that Cas knew where he’d gone before he left. Last time he’d left with little or no explanation it had not gone well at all.

Dean shook Cas’s shoulder until he stirred. “Hey, wake up Cas.”

Cas grumbled unhappily but rolled over and squinted up at Dean. He sat up instantly, alarmed at the sight of seeing Dean already dressed. “What is going on?”

“Take it easy, Cas,” Dean reassured him. “I just wanted to let you know that I was gonna go across the Wall and see Sam. I wanna make sure everything’s good with him.”

Cas relaxed marginally and then stated, “You’re worried about him being around Gabriel.”

Dean very nearly snapped out that of course he was, but then he reconsidered, “Yeah. I kinda do. Can you blame me for worrying about Sam getting involved with a trickster?”

Cas shook his head. “Gabriel may have pretended to be a trickster, but he isn’t one. He poses no inherent threat to Sam.”

Dean nodded, a little reassured by Cas’s confidence. “Okay. I still want to talk to him about it.”

Cas reached over and pulled Dean into an embrace, “Thank you for letting me know where you were going. It would have been unpleasant to wake here alone, again. I will be alright here. Go see your brother.”

“Awesome, thanks Cas, I’ll be back soon,” Dean said, deciding to broach the topic of angels with him when he returned.

* * *

Dean found Sam in the main house. Elaine had apparently cooked up a full continental breakfast for Sam and Gabriel, although only Sam seemed to be inclined to actually eat any of it.

“Dean!” Sam called out at the sight of him, his voice muffled through a mouth full of bacon.

Elaine caught his eye and shoved a full plate full of pancakes and scrambled eggs and bacon and sausage at him. “Good morning, Dean. I assume that this will be sufficient to start you with.”

Gabriel hovered in the corner of the room, holding his own plate of food. Nothing on it appeared to be touched, although he was pushing it around on the plate with a fork, looking a little nauseated. Dean wasn’t sure what was wrong about it. It looked perfectly good and Sam was eating it with a gusto.

“I guess everything is going okay?” Dean asked, taking a bite of the pancakes. He had to stop himself from making an obscene sound at the taste of them – whatever else Elaine was, she was a fantastic cook.

Sam nodded, but then looked askance at Elaine and Gabriel.

“I’d say so, Dean-o,” Gabriel remarked. “Elaine’s got all the raw ingredients around, mostly, and I’m gonna take a quick little flight to get what she couldn’t lay her hands on after breakfast. After that, it’s just prep work and a series of rituals. It should all go smoothly. You can go enjoy your honeymoon without worry.”

Elaine nodded along, coming around with fresh French toast to plop on each of their plates before finally settling down with her own plate full of eggs, pancakes, and a little bacon. “I agree with Gabriel’s assessment. There’s been no setbacks so far and no reason to believe that there will be. It may take a little while for Hell to realize what’s happened, given that it’s not entirely unusual for individuals with a sufficient knowledge of the supernatural to be able to stave off hellhounds for a few days or even a few months. So there should be no interference on that front or any other for a least some time. You’re still welcome to breakfast, and to check in whenever and however much you like.”

Gabriel frowned at Elaine’s open-ended invitation to Dean. She did not appear to be intimidated by him in the least. “You should at least try the toast,” she said blandly to him.

Gabriel didn’t seem pleased by the idea, but he dutifully tore a piece of syrup-covered toast off of his plate and shoved it in his mouth. His eyebrows shot up in surprise. Apparently the toast was good enough to win over even the Trickster.

Dean sat down across from Sam and began to eat, occasionally eyeing Gabriel. Gabriel didn’t appear to be doing much, aside from keeping a watchful eye on everyone else, like he was as unsure about being in the home of a witch as Dean was.

Sam polished off the last of his food and pushed his plate forward. “That was really good Elaine, thank you.”

Elaine shrugged humbly, “It was no trouble. It’s terribly rare, I will admit, for me to have guests to share a meal with. I can only hope that my cooking is to your liking.”

Sam smiled at her, “It really is.”

Dean nodded. “I’d say you could do this professionally if you wanted to. I’d drive all this way just for the bacon.”

For some reason this caused Gabriel to snicker in the corner.

Dean shot him a glare.

“Hey!” Sam snapped. “Can the two of you play nice, please?”

Dean wasn’t about to listen to his little brother about playing nice with the Trickster, but Gabriel’s expression softened when he looked over at Sam. “Sure. I’ll behave myself.” He then placed his mostly untouched plate in front of Sam, who looked down at it in confusion. Gabriel shrugged and said, “Not much of an appetite. Probably shouldn’t waste it, though.”

Sam grinned softly at Gabriel, and Dean still felt discomforted by Sam’s ease around the creature he still couldn’t help but see as the Trickster, and then Sam began to eat up the food that Gabriel hadn’t wanted. (There wasn’t any French toast left on the plate, however.)

“Sorry, Elaine,” Gabriel added, even managing to sound properly apologetic. “Most food doesn’t really agree with my sense of taste. I’m sure that it is all very good.”

Elaine sipped on her tea and acknowledged Gabriel’s apology with a finger held up to indicate she meant to speak. When she finished swallowing, she cleared her throat and said, “I suppose I should have anticipated that. You’re free to refuse whatever you don’t like. I shan’t be offended by it.”

Sam laughed as he tore into the bacon that Gabriel hadn’t ate, “Or you keep trying to feed him, and I can have what he doesn’t want.”

Dean was surprised by this, “What about your rabbit diet?”

Sam shot him a look. “A few days of eating like this isn’t going to kill me, and it’s not that often that we get to eat properly homecooked meals. Besides, this is _absurdly_ good cooking.”

* * *

When breakfast was done, Dean caught Sam’s sleeve before he could follow Elaine and Gabriel into the sitting room. Gabriel and Elaine were getting ready to actually start putting together the ritual ingredients and were in the middle of a frankly disturbing conversation about how best to “shape the vessel from the clay of creation”.

“Sam, can we talk for a minute?” Dean asked, using a tone that he knew that Sam would understand to mean that this wasn’t so much a request as it was a demand.

Sam looked after Elaine and Gabriel but sighed and said, “Okay. Let’s go outside.”

* * *

Sam wasn’t surprised that Dean wanted to speak privately with him. He’d been surprised that Dean hadn’t pulled him to one side the moment they’d gotten outside of the witch’s fortress in Faerie.

The moment they were both outside and Dean had glanced around to make sure that neither Elaine nor Gabriel were listening in, and then asked sharply, “Do you really truly believe that the Trickster is who he’s claiming to be?”

Sam had been expecting something significantly more accusatory, something along the lines of: _What the fuck do you think you’re doing?_ or _Are you sure that that bastard of a trickster hasn’t done anything funny to you? Like a hex or a curse?_ It was actually something of a surprise that Dean wasn’t necessarily questioning Gabriel’s motives, just the idea that Gabriel could be any variety of angel.

“We’ve gone over this before, Dean,” Sam replied, tiredly. “I believe in angels. Even if I didn’t, we both saw Gabriel’s wings. Castiel confirmed that they’re both angels. What more do you want?”

Dean shrugged sheepishly.

“Even if you don’t trust my faith or Gabriel’s assertions, you trust Castiel, don’t you?”

Dean nodded. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

“Then there’s your answer for you.”

They both stood in silence for a few moments. Dean seemed to be reconsidering his entire world view, trying to fit the notion of angels and the implied existence of heaven and God into it. Sam waited, knowing that he needed to tell Dean about everything that Gabriel had told him. He realized he wasn’t going to be able to do so. He couldn’t bring himself to admit to Dean what had actually happened to him as a baby, and he couldn’t bear to admit to Dean what either of their destinies were supposed to be.

“Do you think Elaine took care of the car?”

Sam relaxed at the change in topic and decided to hope that Castiel would fill Dean in, “We could go ask her?”

* * *

It turned out that Elaine had found the Impala where Dean had parked it on the beach, and she had gotten it towed to her property where she’d carefully stored it away in her garage.

It was declared to be in excellent condition by Dean, after he’d spent nearly an hour obsessively checking it over. Sam had nearly laughed at Dean’s bewilderment at having to admit that a witch had actually kept up the maintenance of his beloved classic car.

* * *

A few days later, Sam woke up to find Gabriel missing from the bed they’d taken to sharing.

This wasn’t abnormal for Gabriel, seeing as he did not need to sleep, and even though he really did seem to love cuddling up to Sam for long hours, he did eventually get bored of staying in one place for upwards of eight hours. 

Sam wasn’t concerned about Gabriel being missing at all. He was sure that Gabriel had merely gotten bored and headed to the main house a little early today. It was probable that Elaine was already awake and working on today’s breakfast and it was possible – if not terribly likely - that Dean had already hiked over the Wall to get some of Elaine’s wonderful cooking and check in on the status of everyone and everything over here.

Sam smiled. Gabriel had been trying to get on Dean’s good side for the last few days now, seeing as he was planning on staying with Sam. Sam wasn’t entirely sure how that was going for Gabriel. It was true that Dean and Gabriel did share a similarly wicked sense of humor, so they ought to have had plenty of mischievous ideas to bond over. However, Dean seemed to be defaulting into suspicious older brother mode at the moment, and he wasn’t warming up to Gabriel as much as he might have under other circumstances.

It was also possible that Dean’s uncharacteristic seriousness was born out of anxiety about Castiel’s safety while he couldn’t leave Faerie, and worry that the vessel construct that Elaine and Gabriel were making might not work. And of course, Sam knew that Dean was getting seriously antsy to return to hunting again now that there wasn’t any impending doom hanging over his head. The open road seemed to be calling to Dean, and Dean certainly had never been one to fail to answer its call.

Sam still hadn’t gotten around to informing Dean about all the revelations that Gabriel had told him about the Apocalypse. He’d rather hoped that Castiel might have done so for him, but he was beginning to think that Castiel hadn’t.

* * *

Sam stepped into Elaine’s dining room and was shocked to find several strangers there.

Elaine was present, drinking her favorite orange-flavored tea from her favored cheap blue coffee cup, and sitting in her usual spot at the table.

Gabriel was also present, lurking in the corner of the room, and watching everyone else in the room with a deeply suspicious expression as he nonchalantly leaned against Elaine’s china cabinet. He was holding a plate with an untouched blueberry muffin on it. Sam had come to find out that Gabriel didn’t really care for most foodstuffs – not even candy – but he sometimes enjoyed baked goods. Elaine seemed to have figured this out, too, and she usually made sure to offer him some kind of sweet muffin in the morning, if only out of some odd sense of obligation as their host.

Sam didn’t recognize the other three people in the room. There was a brown-haired woman dressed in a loose linen shirt tucked into dark cotton pants with a saber hanging from the belt at her waist sitting comfortably at the table next to Elaine. She had a cup of coffee in her hands that had so much creamer in it that it looked more like chocolate milk than coffee, and she was halfway through what appeared to be her second blueberry muffin.

The other two were both men that looked like they were sorely in need of a bath, covered as they were with grease and dirt. Their manner of dress reminded Sam of the laborers he had seen while he’d been in Portown, but unlike the laborers, these men carried swords and black powder pistols. They were picking at some coffee cake that had been left over from yesterday’s after-dinner dessert.

The woman that Sam didn’t recognize turned at the sound of him entering the room.

Her eyes lit up in apparent recognition. “You must be Sam! Emma said that you and your star have been staying with her.” This was all declared at a shocking volume and with a surprisingly large amount of enthusiasm. She hurried to place her coffee cup on the table so she could stand up to offer him her hand to shake. “Dean told me so much about you! I was so looking forward to meeting you. I’m so very glad that you’re all right.”

Sam was briefly confused by why this strange woman with her heterochromatic eyes seemed to know him when he was quite certain that he’d never met her. Then it occurred to him how she’d mentioned Dean.

Sam gave her a lopsided grin as he took her hand, happy to finally meet the woman who had kept his brother and Castiel safe and sound for several weeks in Faerie. “You must be Captain Morgan.”

One of Elaine’s eyebrows shot upward. “I was unaware that you’d borrowed my surname, Virginia.”

Captain Morgan went a bit red in the face. “I didn’t think that you would mind me subtly referencing my friend and benefactor with my new name.”

“I thought Virginia Trombley was a perfectly fine name,” Elaine commented kindly, “but it’s your name. I can hardly fault you if you decided to choose a new one. I do it often enough.”

Sam hesitated now, not quite sure what he should call the captain when he thanked her for all she’d done for his brother and for Castiel.

The captain turned back to Elaine and picked up the conversation that she’d been having with Elaine before Sam’s arrival had interrupted. “If everything you were saying is true, Emma, I think returning to my original name – or a variant of it – might be just the thing to separate me from my reputation a little. Although I think I’d still like to go by Jane. I’ve always liked Jane better than Virginia,” the captain stated.

“Captain?” Sam finally decided on her title for now.

Jane turned around to see what he wanted.

“Thank you so very much.”

Jane’s face lit up in a wide smile. “Aiding your brother and his star was a pleasure and an honor.”

She returned to her coffee.

“I don’t want to be rude,” Sam said very hesitantly, as he took a seat at the table, feeling confident that he was among friends, “but I gotta ask, what are you doing here, Jane?”

“That’s my doing,” Elaine answered. “I sent a message to her that requested her presence here as soon as she could possibly get here.”

Jane nodded in agreement, “Emma was just explaining that Stormhold is without an heir apparent to the throne right now. She was telling me how one of my ancestors was a Fae woman who was part of the royal house. In fact, none other than the lost sister of the princes that so recently failed to retrieve the royal ruby.”

Elaine was nodding along with all of this, “Depending on the precise nature of the enchantment that the deceased lord of Stormhold placed on the royal ruby, it may be possible that Jane can assume the throne. Otherwise I’d have to go looking for one of the men in Jane’s family on the human side of the Wall who might make a decent ruler. But truth be told, I’d much rather see Jane on the throne. At least she’s familiar with Faerie and Stormhold.”

“So… you’re gonna need to go find this ruby?” Sam asked Jane.

“Emma said that I wouldn’t need to,” Jane replied. She looked at Elaine with a fondly exasperated expression. “Although she also won’t say precisely why.”

“For one, I’d like to solve one problem before I start seeking new ones,” Elaine retorted, standing up and looking over at the pirates uncomfortably trying to not dirty her home. “If I could borrow your esteemed Mr. Morris, I’d like to send him over the Wall with a message to Dean and Castiel to meet us at the Wall in a few hours.”

“Oh, so the vessel is done cooking, then?” Gabriel said, finally jumping into the conversation.

“I checked it a little earlier this morning. It appears to be ready, yes,” Elaine confirmed.

Jane nodded at her first mate, “Mr. Morris, would you please go fetch our friends from…?” She paused, clearly waiting for someone to indicate where Dean and Castiel were.

“They’re staying at _The Slaughtered Prince_,” Sam supplied for her.

* * *

Within an hour, Sam was helping Gabriel, Elaine and Jane move the vessel construct that Gabriel and Elaine had created for Castiel to the meadow across the Wall. It was a disturbing experience for Sam, because for all intents and purposes the construct looked exactly like Castiel, except that it was stuck in a strange uncanny valley of being too life-like to be a mannequin yet somehow lacking any indication of ever being alive without actually managing to look like a proper corpse. Gabriel promised that once Castiel took possession of it, it would look perfectly normal and alive. It would look exactly how Castiel looked now, in his Faerie construct, except that this body would be able to cross the Wall without fatally transmuting into stone.

By the time the whole group – Elaine, Jane and her taciturn crewman, Sam and Gabriel – made it to the meadow, Dean, Castiel and Mr. Morris were already waiting for them.

The moment Jane stepped through the gap in the Wall, Dean rushed her and scooped her up in an excited bear hug. “Jane! It’s great to see you again!”

Castiel was a little more subdued in his greeting of her, but he was also quick to give her a hug of his own once Dean released her.

“Your first mate here was telling us how you’re gonna be the new Queen of Faerie or something,” Dean said with a wide smile. “Congrats, captain.”

“The new Lady of Stormhold,” corrected Castiel. “Faerie is not a singular political entity.”

“Still awesome, though,” Dean said, clearly not terribly concerned by the political landscape of Faerie.

Elaine stepped through the gap reluctantly and with a grimace. “I suppose we should address that, then, since you’ve already been informed about it. Dean? Castiel? I don’t suppose that one of you still has that gemstone that knocked Castiel out of Heaven?”

Castiel nodded, pulling the large clear stone from the pocket of his overcoat.

Jane’s eyes widened in surprise, only now realizing the importance of the gemstone she’d seen so often around Castiel’s neck on her ship. “Is that?” she asked, staring at it in wonder. “Castiel, may I?” She held out her hand for it, hopefully.

Castiel’s eyes crinkled with good humor and he placed the stone in the center of her palm.

There was the briefest moment when nothing happened. The stone didn’t burst into light or change shape. After that short moment’s pause and without any fanfare, red bled back into the facets of the gem until it was once again a dark red ruby.

Jane’s first mate was the first to speak. “May I be the first, captain, to say: Long live the Queen of Stormhold.”

Elaine nodded happily at this outcome.

There was a quick round of congratulations and a little good-natured ribbing about Jane’s new title, which Jane eventually quieted down before announcing: “My crew will have a place in court, if any of you should want it. And if you don’t, I’ll be in need of good privateers, I should think. The _Gichigami_ will need to be legitimized, of course. I won’t have it any other way, and she’ll need a new captain. Would you be interested in the position, Mr. Morris?”

“I would like nothing better, my lady,” Mr. Morris answered with a grin.

“I don’t mean to interrupt the festivities and all of these royal proclamations,” Gabriel interrupted shamelessly, “but I thought that we were here to finish putting Castiel in his brand-new vessel so he can actually leave Faerie and follow Dean-o into the human world.”

This did bring everyone back around to the project at hand, and soon Gabriel and Elaine were doing the last few ritual preparations.

When they were ready, they performed the spell in tandem. Castiel shone nearly as brightly as he had in the witches’ fortress and the Faerie construct that had been his body shimmered away into brilliant white stardust that drifted into his new body.

The light faded away and Castiel climbed to his feet in the brand-new vessel.

“This does feel much better,” Castiel commented, observing and flexing his new hands. “You’re quite certain that this is safe to cross into the human world with?”

“That vessel comes archangel-guaranteed,” Gabriel replied confidently as Castiel warily approached the gap in the Wall.

Everyone held their breath as Castiel hesitated before taking the final step onto human soil.

There was a pleased burst of shouts when Castiel remained alive and human in appearance as he stood on earthly soil.

* * *

Dean wasted no time in whisking Castiel away to introduce him to his beloved car, and soon the Winchesters and their angels found themselves saying their goodbyes to Elaine and Jane as they packed their things into the Impala.

“You’re all welcome in Witch’s Wood at any time,” Elaine declared as she handed the last armload of freshly laundered clothes to Sam to tuck into the trunk. “Please don’t be strangers.”

Jane hugged each of them, somehow even managing to catch a very surprised Gabriel, before stepping back to sternly declare: “At the very least you need to come back for my coronation. I absolutely insist that all of you be present. Even you, Elaine! I know you don’t like to leave Witch’s Wood, but none of this would have been possible if not for you.”

Dean grinned. “Just let us know when, and we’ll be there, captain.”

“You’d better be,” Jane muttered faux-darkly.

“I’ll be sure to call them for you,” Elaine told Jane. “I have your cell phone numbers, I’m sure I can ensure you make it to Mount Huon on time.”

* * *

Soon enough, the last farewells were exchanged and Sam and Dean climbed into the Impala with their respective angels in the backseat.

As they drove away, Sam wondered what the wider world would have in store for them now. Their actions in Faerie had ruined the careful plans of Hell and Heaven (plans that Sam still needed to tell Dean about) and Sam was certain that there would be repercussions for defying the fates that had been prescribed for them.

Even so, he couldn’t help but feel hopeful for the future as he glanced over his shoulder into the backseat to see Gabriel smiling back at him as he lounged there and Castiel leaning forward to place a hand on Dean’s shoulder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this fanfiction was taken from the poem of the same name by David Harris.
> 
> A few further notes that I’d like to share about how this story came to be:
> 
> It’s no great secret that I am a fan of Stardust and that I’m a fan of Supernatural. Last summer (2018), I was binging my way through a rather large amount of fanfic and got it in my head that I wanted to see what kind of Stardust fusions existed for Supernatural. Unsurprisingly, I was quick to encounter [Fallen in Every Way Imaginable](%E2%80%9C) by [stereophoenix](%E2%80%9C) and [Catch a Fallen Star](%E2%80%9C) by [the__magpie](%E2%80%9C). Both stories are excellent and I recommend them both if you haven't already had the pleasure of reading them, and while I was pleased to read them myself, I felt that something was missing. It took me a while to pinpoint what that missing element was, but it finally occurred to me that both stories lacked any real presence by Sam. I understand why, as it’s certainly easier to adapt Stardust with only Dean and Castiel without having to figure out what to do with Sam. But I began to wonder what it would look like if Sam did play a significant role.
> 
> Shortly thereafter I read [in the land of gods and monsters](%E2%80%9C) by [qqueenofhades](%E2%80%9C), which did something I’d never seen before with a Stardust fusion. It merged the canon world of Lucifer (Netflix) with the world of Stardust without having to transplant the characters into an entirely Stardust based alternate universe. It was such a novel idea! And to my disappointment, I quickly discovered that no similar fic existed for Supernatural.
> 
> I’d also discovered that there was no Stardust AU that had a Sabriel component by this point. (“Fallen in Every Way Imaginable” has Gabriel present in the story, but he shares the fate of the Stormhold princes and never meets with Sam, who is largely absent from the story.)
> 
> All these small frustrations and dissatisfactions came together to cause me to think: “well, if it doesn’t exist, I may very well need to write it myself”. And so I challenged myself to write a story that was largely canon compliant with both the Stardust universe and with the Supernatural universe and canon, and to incorporate a Sabriel element to compliment the Destiel main plot.
> 
> I think that I’ve managed to accomplish this, at least to my own satisfaction. Of course, should anyone else write their take on this premise, I’ll happily be the first to leave excited comments.
> 
> Finally, my ever-grateful thank yous to those who have commented, those who have left kudos, and to all of you who may yet do so in the future. I appreciate you all.


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